


The Manny

by LilyInTheSnow



Series: Manny Diaries [1]
Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - No Powers, Angry Sex, Basically a one paragraph mention, Bottom Bucky Barnes, Dad Steve Rogers, Did i say pining, Floriography, Hate Sex, I don't know what I'm doing, Kid Fic, Language of Flowers, M/M, Manny?, Mutual Pining, Nanny Bucky Barnes, Past Bucky Barnes/Tony Stark, Pining, Post-Serum Steve Rogers, Slow Burn, Spit As Lube, Winter Soldier Bucky Barnes, brief mention of torture, but not really, mild anxiety attacks, so much fucking pining, so so much, the slowest of burns
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-07
Updated: 2018-07-18
Packaged: 2018-12-12 07:55:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 70,869
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11732805
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LilyInTheSnow/pseuds/LilyInTheSnow
Summary: Steve needs a nanny for his twins. Bucky needs a job and secretly adores kids. Natasha thinks they both need a husband. Or to at least get laid. Either way, it works. Or would if they'd get their shit together.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Featuring: Pining, Steve sketching Bucky, flowers in corners of drawings, Bucky having no clue what the flowers mean, and Natasha lamenting the clulessness of the boys.
> 
> This was meant to be my offering for the SBB this year, but I had to drop out due to my health and upcoming surgery. So I'm posting this now. Updates will be every 2-3 weeks. I have almost 35K written on this and probably another 30k to go. The posting schedule will give me time to finish and stay ahead of the chapters.
> 
> Rating may possibly change from M to E in later chapters.
> 
> Also the anxiety attacks are not given in extreme detail. Mostly just rambling in Bucky’s head or from Steve's POV. So expect sweaty Bucky. There's sweaty Steve later too, but for entirely different reasons. (^_-)☆

 

 

Steve opened the door at the quiet knock and could only blink at the man standing on his porch. The gorgeously grungy brunette with blue grey eyes, an adorable dimpled chin covered by scruff, and hair pulled back into a messy bun, was definitely not what he expected when Natasha had recommended the guy as a nanny for their children. Manny? Steve still wasn’t sure of the proper name for him. Caretaker? Either way he looked like he could possibly bench press a truck and/or pick Steve up with one arm and looked like a complete grump.

Natasha said he was a total sweetheart and was excellent with children, but Steve was having his doubts. He knew about first impressions and the man, James, had yet to say a word so he shouldn’t be judging just on appearances, but surely he could have cleaned up a bit before starting his first day of work or at least attempted to smile. Steve felt guilty as hell. He knew how shitty being judged on your appearance felt.

Bucky gave the blonde a weak smile to hide the massive panic attack brewing below the surface. He was in no way, shape, or form prepared for the large blonde that opened the door. He’d been expecting some little nerdy guy when Natasha had said Art History Professor and babysitting a couple kids for a few hours in the afternoons seemed like a decent enough gig so he’d agreed without ever talking to or meeting the guy beforehand. He kind of wished he’d told Natasha no and taken the mission in Oklahoma of all places instead, even if it brought back nightmares of when he’d tripped and landed face first in a pile of cow crap the last time he’d been there.

Because holy fucking shit. Instant boner.

What the hell kind of art teacher was Rogers? What the hell kind of art history did he teach? Did he double as a model? Was he the nude model for his students? Art history people painted and shit too didn’t they? Did he moonlight as a stripper? Was the horrible dad khakis, cardigan, and t-shirt his stripper uniform? and where were the big, thick, acetate framed glasses? Hot For Teacher ran through Bucky's mind and he nearly groaned out loud as he pictured the gorgeous blue eyed blonde stripping. Fuuuck. He was screwed. So very screwed. 

And not in the getting shoved face down on the bed and getting pounded until he couldn’t remember his own name kind of screwed. No. This was the oh so very dangerous wanting to fuck his boss kind of screwed. That didn’t end well. For anybody. He'd done that once and he wouldn't do it again. Granted his old boss had been an asshole of epic proportions, but he'd been a hot asshole. What Stark lacked in height he'd more than made up for below the belt.

It had been fun for a while, but then shit had gone downhill and Stark had started his hiding from feelings shit when there wasn’t supposed to be feelings anyway. Yeah, Bucky didn't do the whole fighting back from being pushed away thing. He had enjoyed his time with Stark, but he had not cared about him as much as he probably should have. It wasn’t like they were in a real relationship anyways. It had gotten weird at work when Bucky ended it so he had put in his resignation and left. 

That was about a year ago and the brunette had been living off of his savings and crashing in Natasha’s spare room ever since. Well that and taking the odd job with her once in a while. Just so he didn’t lose touch with that part of himself. S.H.I.E.L.D. had tried to keep him on contract him full time, but he didn’t really do that anymore. Not unless Natasha asked for help.

Now she’d gotten him a job taking care of a hot blonde’s rugrats while he graded papers, sketches? paintings? or stripped (please be stripping) or whatever it was he did when not on campus.

“Um…” The blonde looked him over from head to toe (again) and Bucky grinned hooking his thumbs in his pockets. Blue eyes with little flecks of green followed the movement and Bucky tensed for a minute when they locked onto the gleaming metal of his left hand. In the end the blonde only smiled softly, apparently Natasha had warned him, and lifted his eyes to Bucky’s. He still didn’t speak and Bucky nearly rolled his eyes then broke the ice. Maybe he’d actually get in the door at some point.

“You Steve? Natasha sent me. Unless I’m in the wrong place?”

“No. I mean, yeah. I mean . . . Yes, I’m Steve. No, you’re not in the wrong place. Sorry. I just . . . please don’t be offended James, but you’re not at all what I was expecting when she said she’d found a nanny for my twins.”

“Bucky. And you’re not what I expected for an art history teacher so we’re even.” Bucky shrugged, sounding more than a little bit rude but he needed to keep his distance from Hot Art Stripper Steve and if he got friendly then there’d be feelings and that just wouldn’t work out. He couldn’t exactly afford to lose a job right now. And there were kids involved. He secretly adored children and hated when they got in the middle of relationships and wound up being hurt. So anything not remotely involving the kids was off the table.

Steve stepped aside to let Bucky in and turned to see Alexi and Alexa standing at the bottom of the stairs looking unlike the little hellions they usually were. That wasn’t to say they couldn’t be and weren’t usually sweet, but they were twins, they were nine, and they were redheads like their birth mother. So yeah. He loved his little demon babies. They grinned at him as if knowing what he was thinking and he winked making them giggle.

“Bucky, these are my kids. Alexi and Alexa. Kids this is your watcher Auntie Tasha found for you.”

What is this, an episode of Buffy? Bucky snorted. He was going to change his name to Giles and rename the twins Buffy and Dawn. Maybe Willow and Zander. It depended on how things went.

Alexa smiled sweetly but her brother only looked the older man over from head to toe and blinked, giving nothing away. He was more like Natasha than he ought to be especially since he only saw her a few times a year and had no clue she was his mother. Steve supposed Alexi’s slight distrust of new people was inherited from Natasha and Alexa’s trusting nature had been inherited from him.

Bucky smiled down at the two redheads that looked almost nothing like their father and quite a bit like a certain redheaded friend of his that he’d known for several years. He knew for a fact, at least he thought he did, that she didn’t have any children but the look that the boy was giving him was all Natasha. It showed absolutely nothing of what he was thinking and there was only one place he’d have learned that because Alexa and Steve’s faces were open books. Showing everything. Alexi was more like his mother. And why the hell hadn’t Natasha said anything about the kids being hers?

“Mr. Barnes is going to help you with homework, will cook dinner if he feels like it or if not you can order out, but you know the rules about that.”

“Pizza or Chinese once a week and every day besides that has to be something healthy.”

“So choose wisely.” Steve grinned and Alexa laughed. “Mr. Barnes will help you with anything you need, short of robbing a bank or a Candy Craze, and if there’s something he’s not sure about he will ask me.”

“Why can’t you help us,” Alexi asked quietly and in Russian. Steve sighed, not seeing Bucky’s raised brow, then answered in English.

“It’s rude to speak in other languages in front of someone who might not understand them and I’m really busy with work right now, baby. You know how busy Daddy gets with school this time of year. It’s only for a few weeks. I promise.”

“Okay.”

“Now, go get started on your homework. I’m going to get started on mine. English only.” The twins nodded then headed into the kitchen to sit at the table and start on their work.

Steve turned to Bucky. “Please don’t take them to rob a bank or a Candy Craze.”

“I make no guarantees. Well, I can guarantee we won’t be robbing a bank, but I’m afraid robbing a Candy Craze is on my bucket list and they seem like the perfect accomplices.” Bucky grinned for a second then schooled it into a slight frown. _No flirting damn it!_ “Maybe we’ll hit the bank after Candy Craze.” 

He shrugged then walked in the direction the kids had gone in, following the sound of whispered Russian interspersed with French. What even was that? Why mix the two languages? Were they tiny spies like their mother? And had Steve been one at some point? Was that how he knew Natasha? Was he S.H.I.E.L.D? How did he know her well enough to knock her up? Obviously the kids didn’t know she was really their mom and he didn’t want to interrogate them because only assholes stooped so low as to ask kids questions about their parents.

“What’s first,” he asked instead as he sat across from them. Alexa smiled sweetly and tapped her pencil on her math book. “Math blows,” he groaned reaching across the table for the most hated of school subjects.

“Das ist wahr,” Alexi mumbled.

“How many languages do you know?”

“Two and a half besides English. We just started on German last week.” Alexa was the one that answered him while her twin only shrugged.

“Why so many?”

“Auntie Tasha and Daddy wanted us to learn them.”

“Shut up, Lexa! You tell him too much.”

She stuck her tongue out at her brother but turned back to her math. Bucky smiled. Alexi was just like Natasha. Keeping everything close to the vest and not giving anything away unless he saw fit or needed to use what he had to bargain for something else. 

Bucky planned on exploiting that a little bit he thought as they finished their math and started on science. He’d always been good at science and apparently it was Alexi’s favorite subject. He wasn’t going to do anything bad. Just give the kid a nudge into being civil or even friendly toward him. It would take some time, he knew. Just like it had taken Natasha time to trust him and befriend him. She didn’t trust easily. Never had. Even after so many years she still didn’t trust him enough to tell him she had twins with a gorgeous man she’d never mentioned before. True she wasn’t exactly their mother and appeared only to have been a surrogate, but still she had children and he’d never known about them.

“Okay, let’s do this,” Bucky murmured glancing over the lesson in their science book. “I thought you guys were in 3rd grade? What are they doing teaching genetics in 3rd grade now?”

“Advanced Science classes.”

“Awesome.”

***

Steve groaned opening another email from one of his students. Another student that wanted his advice or approval or any number of things they didn’t honestly need from him. At this point he didn’t even care what they did as long as they had something finished and turned in on time. He’d given them two options. The first was that each student was to pick one iconic painting and do a short, formal analysis and a research paper with an iconographic analysis. Or they could do a comparative analysis on two artworks by the same artist during different periods of their work. It really wasn’t that difficult. There was no reason his students should be having so much trouble. He’d let them off relatively easy considering how much he’d tortured his previous years’ students.

He glanced over the email that was asking him for an extra week on the assignment even though they’d been given a month to turn it in and he smacked his head on his desk. He loved his students. “I love my job. I love my job. I love my job,” he repeated the mantra as he denied the request. He could be spending time with his kids right now. He could be helping his own children with their homework instead of someone else’s. He could be cooking them dinner. Playing games. Sneaking down there and watching the hot brunette he didn’t know take care of his kids just because Natasha had promised he was a good guy. 

Steve jolted when he realized he knew absolutely nothing about him other than the fact that Natasha said he was good with kids. Well, and the fact that he was gorgeous. It shocked him that he trusted her so much that he had just taken her word on it and not even bothered checking out Barnes on his own. Although, Natasha had infinitely better resources at her disposal than he did. He’d lost all of his abilities to take someone’s name and find out every little detail of their lives when he’d left his old life behind to become a teacher. To eventually become a father. Still he had intuition and though he and Barnes hadn’t spoken but for two seconds he seemed like a decent guy. He’d ask the twins what they thought about Bucky after he left for the evening. If they didn’t like him then he’d apologize to the gorgeous scruffy man and then call Natasha and tell her that the kids didn’t like him, beg her forgiveness, and hope she helped him find someone else to help him out with the kids for a few weeks.

He sighed wearily, God he was exhausted already, and started back on his emails.

When he finally finished in his office it was close to eight and he stood with a groan, popping his back and shoulders. He needed a taller desk. He didn’t even want a damn desk. He loved teaching, he honestly did, but sometimes he just wished he could paint again. That he didn’t have to worry about whether or not there were groceries in the fridge or if he could pay his bills. That kind of life, living from painting to painting, wouldn’t be right for the twins. He couldn’t put his children though that. If he was on his own he’d do it in a heartbeat but there were two other hearts he had to take care of and if sitting behind a desk at home for hours at a time after spending all day at campus with temperamental art students was the cost, then he would do it. 

He headed down the stairs and smiled when he heard his children laughing. A deeper laugh followed and he nearly sighed. God, Bucky had a great laugh. He walked into the kitchen and saw the kids sitting on one side of the table, Bucky on the other and their books, a pizza, and a salad spread out between them. Alexi had ranch smeared on his chin and was chewing while laughing again at whatever Bucky had said. Alexa rolled her eyes at her twin and dabbed at her own mouth delicately.

“Hey. Homework done?”

Bucky straightened immediately from where he’d been leaning over the table toward the twins as they had talked and nodded. “Yeah. Everything’s done. Ordered pizza for dinner. Made a salad. Figured you were one of those annoying parents that wants their kids to have green leafy stuff all the time like it’ll be the end of the world without it.”

Well then. Steve only blinked at the brunette then looked the twins who had pretty much cleared their plates and from the amount of pizza gone from the box he figured they’d eaten decently enough. “Why don’t you two go get cleaned up for bed yeah? I’ll walk Mr. Barnes out.”

“Okay, Daddy.” Alexa grinned up at her father then grabbed her brother’s hand and dragged him out of the kitchen.

Steve watched them go then turned back to Bucky in time to see him schooling his smile into a frown. “Were they all right?”

“They were fine. They’re good kids. Smart. Alexi has a little bit of a hard time reading.”

“He’s dyslexic. He’s got a helper at school a couple days a week. She teaches him little tricks that help him switch things back around.”

“That’s good. Alexa is just lazy about her math. She can do it; she’s plenty smart, just lazy.”

“She hates math.”

“Everyone does.”

“Right. Well, thank you for doing this. I know it seems like I’m not . . .  as involved with my children as I should be.”

“I didn’t say that.”

“You don’t have to. I know how it looks.” Steve waved a hand vaguely in the direction of the rest of the three-story house he’d bought with his inheritance and money he’d made working for S.H.I.E.L.D. He may have gone overboard, but it was a really nice house and he’d been tired of living in shoeboxes and didn’t want his babies to live in one either.

“A butler didn’t answer the door, Steve. Natasha told me you just need a bit of help right now. That’s it, that’s all. I’m the help. You don’t have to explain anything to me. I’m just here to take care of the kids in the afternoons.” With that Bucky shrugged one shoulder dismissively then walked out of the kitchen, leaving Steve staring after him and flinching when the front door opened then swung shut.

What an asshole! Steve glared at the empty doorway then sighed. He was pretty, but pretty didn’t excuse being a dick. What was his issue? Bucky didn’t seem to have one with the kids, actually seemed to like them, but what was his issue with Steve? He frowned walking up the stairs to the kid’s room to peek in on them to make sure they were getting ready for bed. He had tried to separate them and give them their own rooms but they kept sneaking back together so he had decided to leave them until they were ready. He figured that they would decide when they were ready to have separate rooms. Probably soon the way his demon babies had been fighting some days.

Alexa was already in her pajamas, lying on her bed and reading a book. Alexi was singing from the bathroom and Steve smiled then backed out of the room to go back downstairs and call Natasha and ask her if she was absolutely sure about Bucky Barnes.

Steve went back to the kitchen to start cleaning up the kid’s mess from dinner and swiped through his phone for Natasha’s number. She answered after the second ring making him think that she’d been waiting for him to call. She probably had.

“How’s it going, Rogers?”

“Nat, are you sure about this guy? He seems kinda … gruff? I mean he's alright with the kids but he's kind of a douchebag.” He was scraping the leftovers in the pail to take to the compost bin as he spoke.

Natasha laughed. “He'll be fine Steve. He's really a great guy. Give him time to get used to you. It's only been a day.”

Steve groaned, thunking his head on the kitchen counter. “If you're sure.”

“I wouldn’t have mentioned him at all if I wasn’t sure. They may not be my kids, but I still care about them, Steve.”

“Natasha,” he sighed. He sometimes felt like shit that he and Natasha were the only ones that knew she was the kid's mother. “You know we can tell them if you want to. They love you already.”

“I'd rather be Auntie Tasha than Mommy, Rogers. You know that.”

“I know.” Steve smiled weakly even though she couldn't see him.

“You know I'm fine with them just being your kids, Steve. That was the plan before we had them. Best sex I ever had though. You're sure you're gay?”

“Jesus, Natasha! You can’t just say shit like that!”

She giggled, a rarity for her, and then hung up before he could say anything else. At least she hadn't brought up the fact that he had been so drunk he could barely walk. And yeah, they could have gone to a clinic, would have been easier, but Natasha had refused. She worked for the government and had a healthy, or unhealthy if you wanted to get technical about it, dose of paranoia. So he'd gotten drunk off his ass, even though she wasn’t the first woman he had ever been with because he’d been with a couple before figuring out that they didn’t have the equipment he wanted, and they'd had sex. 

He had run in the morning after he'd woken up to Natasha's giggles and comments on his form. Asking him if he was sure he was gay and did he want to go again to make sure. He had blushed the entire time he pulled his clothes on and then ran out of her apartment. A few weeks later she'd called to tell him she was pregnant and now, almost ten years later he had twin 3rd graders. 

He had thought that they would get easier to take care of as they got older. He'd been wrong. He adored his twins. He really did. But still, more often than not, he realized he had no clue what he was doing. He did his best and they seemed happy, but he still worried. He was still apprehensive about getting a nanny for them because he'd seen single moms take care of their kids on their own and they had his total respect and admiration, but he just needed a little help now and again. He especially needed it when it got close to finals. He hated this time of year. Absolutely fucking hated it.

“Daddy!” He heard Alexi yell for him and Alexa followed her older brother soon after. He sighed then walked into their bedroom and smiled when he saw that they had pushed their beds together after he'd left the room.

“If you start fighting I'll move them back.” He softened the threat with a smile. He had already had to move their beds across the room on several occasions.

“We won't!” Alexa promised with a grin he didn't trust for a single second. That mischievous grin was all him. Alexi was more like Natasha. Quiet and always watching everyone around him. He was suspicious by nature like his birth mother and only trusted a select few. Steve counted himself lucky to be one of those few. Alexa loved everyone.

“What did you think about...Mr. Barnes?” He couldn't manage to call the ex-whatever branch of the military Natasha had found him in- a nanny. Or was he a manny? It was probably extremely juvenile that he wanted to giggle about it, but other than that Bucky was fucking gorgeous, even if he was a bit of a dick. Such a dick.

Both kids shrugged after looking at each other for a moment. “He's okay,” Alexa murmured. “He's good at math.”

“And he likes science too!” Alexi grinned and bounced halfway across their beds. “He said he's read all kinds of books about it!”

“So you think you should keep him?”

Alexa nodded quickly which Steve should have known it was a given with her. Alexi nodded too, slower this time.

“He's okay, Daddy.”

“All right, okay. We'll see how it goes.”

“I like him,” Alexa added with a grin. “We gonna read before bed?”

“What?”

“Are we going to read a book before bed?”

Steve stared down at her with playfully narrowed eyes then nodded and carefully flung himself down between them on the pushed together beds. They immediately snuggled against him and Alexi handed him a leather bound copy of  _ Grimm’s Complete Fairy Tales _ . The real ones. The scary ones that weren’t PC or dumbed down. It was the twins’ favorite book. “Which one should we read tonight?”

“ _ The Girl Without Hands _ !”

“Yeah?” They both nodded and Steve opened the book, flipping through pages until he found the story. “A certain miller had little by little fallen into poverty, and had nothing left but his mill and a large apple tree behind it. Once when he had gone into the forest to fetch wood, an old man stepped up to him whom he had never seen before and said, “Why dost thou plague thyself with cutting wood, I will make thee rich, if thou wilt promise me what is standing behind thy mill.”

“It’s not the apple tree,” Lexa warned quietly. Steve laughed then continued to read the short story.

He read three more stories before the twins fell asleep. He closed the book silently then gave them each a gentle kiss and slid out between them, turning to watch as they unerringly found each other and snuggled closely. They had always slept wrapped around each other. Had since birth practically. Neither of them wanting to be away from the other in their sleep. It was cute and he felt a little bit sad that one day they wouldn’t be together anymore. His babies were growing up. Christ, he wasn’t ready for that. He fled the room before he could start crying and closed their door all but a crack so he would hear if they woke and called for him. Truthfully they hadn’t needed him during the night in a long time, not unless one of them had a nightmare, but he still listened for them.

Steve walked down the stairs slowly, expertly dodging the creaky steps, and then moved around the house turning off the lights and locking the front door. He always did the kitchen lights and door last, taking out the day’s scraps to put in the compost for the garden he and the twins planted every year. They had carrots, cauliflower, and lettuce growing right now.  After those finished for the year they would turn the dirt over and plant pumpkins, gourds, and watermelon. They tried to plant something different every year and those were the things the twins had picked out this time around. Alexa read The Old Farmer’s Almanac religiously to see when they could begin planting their garden.

She and her brother wanted chickens too, had even checked the town’s charter to see if they were allowed and found out that they could have a maximum of four and only hens. They’d also made a list of breeds that were relatively docile and good layers. Checked for nutritional needs and proper care and housing. All of this, without even consulting Steve until they’d found out the proper intel. He thought that maybe they had listened to Natasha talking about work one too many times. Though he did almost go out and find them some chickens just because they had shown initiative and he was proud of them for doing their research before jumping in on their newest project. Still, he wasn’t sure if he was ready for chickens yet. Maybe they’d get some during the summer when they had more free time.

He shook his head with a smile as he went back up the stairs and to his bedroom. How had he gone from art school to army to S.H.I.E.L.D. to professor with twins who wanted to plant gardens and raise chickens? He was lucky. Beyond lucky. He knew he was. So many things he’d done in his life should have killed him. Being born with a list of illnesses as long as his arm, fighting fights he had no business getting into, working two jobs and going to art school while helping his mother pay her hospital bills, suddenly growing into his 6’2, 240 pound body a few years too late for puberty. (Well, he’d had a little bit of help.) His health problems were pretty much cleared up now. He’d retired from a life that definitely could have killed him and was happily raising his children. He had Natasha, his best friend who had kept him under her wing during his S.H.I.E.L.D. years, and Sam who was one of the counselors on campus and whom Steve had known for most of his life. He was definitely lucky. And right now he was definitely exhausted, he thought as he stripped down to his boxers and fell on his bed.

***

Bucky walked into Natasha’s house and groaned, “I hate you.”

She laughed from her place on the couch and watched him as he walked straight into the kitchen and grabbed one of his nasty beers that he absolutely loved. Some kind of pilsner from a local brewery. They were absolutely awful. “Why?”

“He’s fucking gorgeous.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah. And you already knew that.” She only smiled sweetly, something that irritated him more often than not and he flopped down beside her. “Why didn't you tell me they were your kids?

“They aren't.” She gave him a look he couldn't decipher and he frowned looking down at his beer bottle, picking at the label and flicking the little pieces of paper on the coffee table. He knew he’d have to pick it up later or she’d strangle him, but he did it anyway.

“Alexi is a spitting image of you. Alexa looks a hair bit more like Steve than her brother, but they are definitely your kids.”

“The twins are not my children.” He glared at her for treating him like he was stupid and she sighed. “They're Steve's kids. I just gave birth to them. He was ready for babies, for family, he wasn’t in a relationship. I volunteered.”

“That's why you went off the radar for over a year.”

“Yeah, I told everyone it was an extended mission. Deep under cover. The whole mess. Steve got his babies and I get to play Auntie Tasha a few times a year. It’s good this way. Better. Definitely safer.”

“For them, or for you?” Green eyes narrowed dangerously at him but he held her gaze while taking a sip of his beer. She scared him, of course she did, but she had also been his best friend for the past ten years and he knew when she was really pissed off at him and when she was mildly irritated. Right now she was somewhere in the middle.

“Them. For Steve and the twins. You can’t have a family and do what we do for a living. Not really. You can pretend for a while. You can try to have a family, a partner, kids, a house and a dog, but it doesn’t last. It can’t. Not when so much of our lives revolve around lying to everyone we know. Steve got out. He was ready to leave it all behind. He got his house and he got his job and he got his babies. That’s the life he wanted and an agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. can’t have that. So he does a job he mostly enjoys to provide the life for the twins that he never had. Trust me; it’s safer for all those involved that I’m not in their lives more than what I am.”

“So, did you send me to Steve’s to watch over the kids because you can’t? Or because I needed the money?”

“Because you needed the money, because Steve needs help right now and you’re the only other person I trust enough to help him take care of the kids. I’m sure he feels safer knowing your background.”

“How much of it?” It wasn’t Natasha’s story to tell. She had to know that. He knew she wouldn’t betray his trust, not unless there was no other option. So how much had she told Steve about his past? Had she told him about his being captured and tortured for six months? The loss of his left arm due to the infection they’d let him get by failing to clean the wounds properly? Though he’d always pretty much figured that was part of the torture. The explosion he had made while hoping to either escape or die trying that had caused the scarring down his left side and helped cauterize his other wounds? The years of therapy: mental and physical? 

“Only that you joined S.H.I.E.L.D. pretty much right after he left and you’re ex-military. It’s not my story to tell, James.”

“Okay. I’m sorry. I just…”

“It’s fine. He never has to know if you don’t want him to.”

“You warned him about the arm though,” he murmured wiggling the fingers of his left hand. She snorted with a slight glare. He knew better than that.

“There was nothing to warn him about. It’s your arm. I’m sure he didn’t say a thing about it and neither would the twins. It’s an arm. It’s  _ your  _ arm. That’s all.”

“Yeah. Yeah, okay.” He downed the rest of his beer then swept the torn label pieces off the table and into his hand, carrying them with him when he stood and walked into the kitchen. He tossed the bottle and bits of paper into the trash a little harder than necessary, enjoying the loud clinking of glass hitting glass from previous bottles and watching the little pieces of paper fluttering down on top of the bottles. He almost went to the fridge for another beer then shook his head. He didn’t need it. Didn’t even want it. He was stressing over nothing honestly. He had nothing to worry about.

All he had to do was go to Steve’s around four, stay until eight or so helping the kids with homework and dinner, and then come home. That was it. That was all. Avoiding Art Stripper Steve wouldn’t be that much of a challenge because he’d be in his office all evening. Bucky would only have to see him for like five minutes max and he could restrain himself from doing something stupid for that long. Couldn’t he? Probably. Maybe especially if Steve was wearing another horrible khaki, cardigan, and shirt combo. That would be enough to let him hold himself back. Right? He glanced up at the ceiling pitifully looking for an answer. Not receiving one, he took a deep breath to steady himself and gave a decisive nod. He could do this.

Steve was gorgeous, so fucking gorgeous, but that didn’t mean Bucky was going to jump him first thing. Or ever. Not jumping him was good. Not sleeping with their boss was something a lot of people did right? Besides, Steve probably wasn’t interested. And probably he only liked women. So Bucky was worried over nothing. Right? Besides, there were kids involved and absolutely nothing could jeopardize the kids. Steve was his boss, his gorgeous blue-eyed boss, and that was that. He wasn’t his friend, wasn’t anything more than an employer. Bucky would do his job; he would take care of the kids and help them with their homework and that was it.

Bucky would take care of the kids, be just this side of rude to Steve so he wouldn’t get attached or have to worry about being friendly without it leading to flirting or something else equally stupid, and that was that. He’d be fine. Totally fine.    

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is completely unbeta'd so if anyone would like to beta the rest you'd have my undying gratitude and love and possibly cookies. Or soap. I make soap too. Lol
> 
> Das ist wahr - This is true.
> 
> Which is the extent of my knowledge of the German language aside from yes, no, and counting to 3.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bucky so wasn't fine.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, I lied about the posting schedule. This time. Next chapter will be in a couple weeks, I just really wanted to get this one out today.

Bucky so wasn’t fine. He was dying. His heart was palpitating, his mouth was dry, he was sweating, he wasn’t even sure if he was blinking or not, he couldn’t breathe, his left arm was numb. Was he having a heart attack?

“Um…are you okay, Bucky? You look kind of…sweaty?” Steve blinked at the brunette who had yet to say a word. Did he have anxiety? Was he having a panic attack? It was the same thing as yesterday. Sort of. Bucky had looked him over from head to toe and then froze. He wasn’t even blinking. Steve wasn’t even sure if the brunette was breathing. “Hey, Bucky?” What if he was having some kind of episode? Natasha had said he was with S.H.I.E.L.D. and obviously something had happened to warrant the arm. S.H.I.E.L.D. was very, very, careful with whom they gave them to. So maybe not an episode? Steve wasn’t sure if he should reach out and touch Bucky to ground him or not. It would either be a blessing and help him or a curse and make it worse. Whatever it was. Should he call Natasha?

_ Your left arm is always numb, dumb shit. Fuck! Just breathe, Bucky. Breathe. It’s fine. You’re fine. You’re absolutely fine. _ He wasn’t fine. No, because Art Stripper Steve had opened the door wearing a grey V-neck tee shirt that was at least two sizes too small and a pair of faded, well-loved jeans that had holes worn in the knees and were so threadbare they were practically see through as they stretched around his thighs and were splattered with different colors of paint. His shirt clung to muscles that no art teacher should ever have, his pecs were begging Bucky to grab handfuls and his nipples were erect and pressing against the thin t-shirt knit. And his jeans? Oh, God. They barely concealed what Bucky thought would be a very impressive dick judging by the bulge behind the zipper. That wasn’t even the worst (best) part. No, the worst part of all of it was Steve was wearing the thick black acetate framed glasses Bucky thought he should have had on the day before. They made his eyes pop, appearing larger and bluer than they had before. He could see the little green specks even clearer and he kind of wanted to just fall into them and never leave.

Christ, why did this have to happen to him? Why couldn’t Steve have been the little tiny art nerd he’d imagined when Natasha had told him about the job? Why couldn’t he be a tiny dweeby guy? Not that there was anything wrong with little dweeby guys, Bucky’d had a twink or two in his time, but why did Steve have to be this massive, beefy, blonde? He was so Bucky’s kryptonite and if he was being honest with himself he kind of more than hated Natasha right now for doing this to him. He loved her for it too because, damn, but he needed to not have this in his life. Not when he was supposed to be watching the guy’s kids.

_ Oh shit! The kids _ . That’s why he was here. To help them with their homework and cook dinner and stuff. Not lust after their father. The kids that were currently standing at the bottom of the steps looking at him worriedly he noticed when he finally managed to drag his eyes away from their Adonis-like father. Alexa looked more worried than her brother, biting her bottom lip and frowning slightly. Alexi only blinked and one corner of his mouth turned down for a split second.

“Mr. Barnes!”

Bucky jumped, his heart racing in his chest, and swallowed loudly. It wasn’t a gulp. Really, it wasn’t. He looked back to Steve who was staring concernedly and reaching a hand out toward him slowly, choreographing his movements. “Huh? Oh, there’s the glasses.”  _ Smooth Barnes. Real smooth. _

“What?” Steve just blinked at him through those horrible (perfect) glasses. Bucky only shook his head. “Are you all right? Do you need to go home? Need me to call anyone for you?”

“What? No, no. I’m fine. Sorry, I just…”

“You looked like you were having a panic attack.”

“I’m okay. It’s nothing.” And it would continue to be nothing because the kids and bosses and relationships with bosses who had kids just wouldn’t work out. Someone would get hurt along the way and it would most likely be the kids. So yeah, no.

“You’re sure? You can take the evening off if you need it?”

_ God, he’s so sweet. _ “No, thanks though. I’m fine. I just need a glass of water and I’ll be right as rain.”  _ Right as rain? Who even said that anymore? _ “I just started yesterday. It’d be kind of shitty of me to already be taking a day off anyway, Rogers. I’ll be fine in a minute.” As soon as Steve went to his office Bucky would be able to breathe again and focus on the two little redheads.

“Language, Mr. Barnes.” Steve’s concerned gaze shifted slightly toward a glare and the twins giggled.

“You say worse than that all the time, daddy,” Alexa said, the words muffled behind her hands as she giggled more.

“Ha! You got narked on.” Bucky snorted earning a glare from Steve and the twins giggled again. “I promise not to use any more bad language words around your spawn.”

“Please don’t call them spawn.”

“But you call us demon spawn all the time. We’re your little soulless ginger demon babies.”

Steve groaned pinching the bridge of his nose, pushing his glasses up his face. “Homework.”

“I like you, kid.” Bucky winked at Alexa and she giggled then ran into the kitchen with Alexi following after her slowly. “Your daughter is a nark.”

“I’m aware,” Steve groaned dropping his hand and let his glasses fall back to his nose. “So, watch what you say in front of them, yeah?”

Bucky gave him a cocky salute then slipped past him into the house, biting back a groan when his arm bumped into Steve causing little pulses to fire in his brain to let him know his left arm had been touched. He walked into the kitchen where Alexa was digging in the fridge and came out with a bottle of water then handed it to him and went to sit at the table and opened her math book. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome Mr. Barnes. You sure you’re okay? You looked like daddy made you nervous or something.”

“Nervous ain’t the word I would use.” She only tilted her head to the side, unblinking then grinned. “What’s up in the world of Math today?” He needed to distract her before she figured out that he was crushing hardcore on her daddy.

“We’re starting on Geometry. Just basic stuff, but I don’t understand the angles and hypotenuses and stuff.”

“Yeah…gimme your book. Let me read over your lesson and see if I can remember how to do this.” He did know, honestly, but he wasn’t sure he should explain angles and such to a third grader by telling her about how to judge angles and get the perfect head shot when using a sniper rifle. Steve probably wouldn’t appreciate it very much and then he’d be out of a job. Well, aside from not getting paid it wouldn’t suck that badly because then he wouldn’t have the temptation of the 6’2” Adonis that was making his way up the stairs. Bucky took a drink of his water then sat the bottle aside when Alexa slid the book over to him. “Let’s get this show on the road, huh?”

***

Steve sat at his desk, twirling an ink pen on the hardwood. Maybe he was being paranoid. Bucky seemed to have come out of his fit or whatever he’d been having and seemed fine for the two seconds he’d actually spoken before fleeing to the kitchen after a cocky salute that’d had Steve fighting back the urge to salute back. Steve had watched him with the kids for a couple minutes before going upstairs. Not because he didn’t trust him, but just in case whatever had happened, happened again. They started with Alexa’s math and Steve smiled softly when Bucky took her book and began reading over the lesson to reacquaint himself with something he probably hadn’t had to do in years. 

Steve decided they were probably okay, but left his office door open as usual just in case something went wrong. Probably it wouldn’t. They’d be fine, just like the day before. It was fine. They were fine.

So now Steve was sat in his office staring down at the twirling ink pen instead of checking his emails and going over the samples his students had emailed of their work since last night and the end of their school day. Really he should just do it and get done with it, but he couldn’t concentrate on it for some reason. “You know why,” he murmured to himself spinning the ink pen once more.

Bucky. Bucky Barnes. Jesus. The man was gorgeous but a mess and a half. Steve was tempted to call Natasha again but he knew he’d get the same answer he’d gotten the day before. She trusted the brunette so he would too. He just wasn’t sure what to do if and when Bucky had another episode. He could ask Bucky, but he thought it might embarrass him. Either that or piss him off. Bucky seemed like someone who would have a short fuse where prying adults were involved, but would probably answer the million and one questions kids would ask with the endless patience of a saint. Bucky was probably a good guy like that. He probably never got impatient with kids. Not like Steve did sometimes when they were being brats or fighting.

He groaned dropping his head to his desk then whimpered. “Get to work. Get to work. Get to work.” He really needed to. The longer he fucked around the longer it would take him to get done. The longer Bucky would have to hang around and while he clearly liked the kids and Steve wasn’t at all biased (ha) when he wondered who wouldn’t like them, Bucky clearly didn’t like Steve for whatever reason. Steve was torn between wanting to work on that, to find out why the brunette didn’t like him, and wanting to just not be in the same room with him for longer than necessary. It unnerved Steve for some reason that the man he might have wanted to at the very least become friends with, seemed to hate him for some reason. He hadn’t even done anything to him. 

Was it petty that he sort of wanted to give Bucky a reason to hate him? He’d never actually do it. There was no sense in being hurtful just to be hurtful. No reason to be cruel to anyone if it could be helped. So what the hell was Bucky Barnes’ problem? Not that he’d been cruel just…unfriendly.

Steve growled then sat up and lifted the screen of his laptop. “Let’s do this shit,” he murmured with a heavy sigh.

***

Bucky and the twins looked up at the ceiling as one when they heard a loud bang coming from upstairs. It happened again moments later, followed by rapid muted thuds and Bucky looked back to the twins. “What is that?”

“Daddy’s boxing. He does it when his students are being pains,” Alexa murmured looking back to her homework. She had one last science problem and then she would be done. Alexi had two more questions in his reading booklet before he was finished.

“Daddy boxes when he’s angry with them?” Jesus, don’t call him Daddy, Barnes. That’s a whole other situation. Not that Bucky was necessarily opposed to calling Steve Daddy at some point.  _ Christ! Get it together, Barnes. _

“Yeah. When they drive him crazy. It only happens around now. Maybe you can go talk to him? Tell him to take a break and he can have dinner with us tonight,” Alexi murmured finally looking back at his book.

“I dunno if that’s a good idea. Steve’s probably really busy. That’s why he hired me, right?”

“Well, yeah, but…” Alexa pouted and Bucky knew he was screwed. She looked so much like her daddy when she pouted. Bottom lip jutted out, that crease between her eyebrows. So adorable.

“I’ll go see in a few minutes, okay? No promises that he’ll join us though. Finish your work first.”

“Okay, Mr. Barnes.”

Bucky watched with a small smile as Alexa finished her paper and slammed her book shut then immediately turned to her brother and helped him read his last question and find the answer in his booklet. When they were finished they stacked all of their books, getting them neatly in order, then put them in their rucksacks and carried them to the living room to hang them on hooks by the door. When they came back they gave Bucky expectant looks as they sat at the table and he sighed heavily, one again glancing up at the ceiling where the muted thumps were still happening although maybe a bit slower. Maybe Steve had calmed down some.

“Fine. Let me go check. You two think about what you want for dinner tonight, okay?”

“Okay.”

Bucky walked out of the kitchen well aware of the twins’ eyes on him as he left. What were they doing? He shook his head and climbed the stairs slowly, listening to Steve hit the punching bag. He found him in a room that was obviously his office. The door was hanging open which explained how loud it had been downstairs. There was a large cherry wood desk and an office chair on one side. A laptop sat crookedly on the desk. A mason jar that held ink pens and all sorts of pencils sat on one corner and had most likely been made by one of the twins, probably Alexa since it was covered in butterflies, flowers, and pink glitter. There were sketches and drawings hung on the walls, some the twins had done he could tell and some were probably Steve’s.

One sketch caught his eye and he walked toward it slowly, smiling when he realized it was Natasha sitting on the couch with the twins when they’d been smaller. She was reading them a book and they were all smiling happily. Bucky found it kind of sad that they didn’t even realize the woman reading to them was their birth mother. Still, it wasn’t his job to worry about that. They would be told or they would realize it on their own. It wasn’t any of his business.

No, his business was trying to talk Steve into joining them for dinner. Steve had hired him to take care of the kids. That was the whole point of Bucky being here. Taking care of the kids for a few hours a day so Steve could finish whatever it was exactly that he did for a living. Bucky knew very little about art, knew even less about art school or art history. Again, not his job. That didn’t mean Bucky was supposed to come up here and talk Steve into eating dinner with his kids instead of pounding away at a defenseless punching bag.

He finally turned to see Steve so he could talk to him and nearly swallowed his tongue. Christ he had to quit this job before he keeled over. Steve was covered in sweat, his hair wet with it. He was still wearing the shirt and jeans combo, only now his shirt was damp with sweat, clinging to his back more obscenely than it already had been and his jeans had slipped down his hips, showing the waistband of his boxers and the slight swell at the top of his ass. And what a perfect ass it was. How the hell did Steve even have an ass like that if he worked out as much as he looked like he did? It jiggled enticingly as he hit the bag and bounced on his feet lightly while throwing punches that had the bag swaying on its stand. Bucky wanted to grab handfuls and bury his face between those perfect cheeks.  _ Jesus, Buck, get it together man! _

He cleared his throat, looking away from Steve to calm himself for a moment before he got lost in his own head again like he had earlier. That had been beyond mortifying. He hoped Steve didn’t realize what had been happening to him. Though Steve had been treating him like he’d been having a panic attack, which he guessed he had been, but not for whatever reason Steve was probably thinking. He shook his head at his own stupidity then walked closer to Steve, not realizing how silent his footsteps were until he spoke Steve’s name and the blonde whipped around in shock.

“Bucky!” Bucky took a few steps back and held his hands up and Steve lowered his own from where they’d been held in front of him defensively. Jesus, the last thing he needed to do was scare off the nanny. “What are you doing in here?”

“Um…the kids. You. Dinner. Tonight,” Bucky rambled then turned on his heels and left the room, closing the door behind him.

“Shit!” Steve shook his head and dropped to the floor, pulling his knees up to rest his forearms on them. He hadn’t heard Bucky come in over the noise in his head, the pounding beat of his fists on the canvas bag, the rush of blood in his ears. How long had Bucky been trying to get his attention? Had he even tried before then? “Fuck.” He groaned, hoping he hadn’t scared Bucky off, and then started unwrapping the sports tape from his hands.

He flexed his hands after the tape was off then stood and tossed it in the trash bin next to his desk. From what Bucky had rambled he figured the kids wanted him to take a break and eat dinner with them tonight. He only had a few emails left to answer and he could do that after dinner. For now he needed a shower. His shirt and jeans were clinging to him from sweat, his hair disheveled and sweat soaked. He was gross. And Bucky had seen him that way. Gorgeous mostly put together Bucky had seen him looking disgusting. Bucky was a mess, a beautiful mess, but still…right now he was more put together than Steve was. He grimaced then walked out of his office and to his bedroom to take a quick shower in the master bath and get ready for dinner.

Bucky fled to the kitchen were the twins were digging in the fridge and took a breath to steady himself so they wouldn’t notice anything had happened. Not that anything had happened except for startling Steve and then getting startled himself when Steve had whipped around with his fists up. Bucky knew Steve hadn’t been about to hit him, but with what they both did or had done for a living it wasn’t necessarily surprising. Though usually Bucky would’ve done the same thing Steve had instead of practically cowering away from him. Of course Bucky wasn’t usually distracted by hot, sweaty blondes with perfect bodies. He shook his head again then spoke to the twins.

“Figure anything out?”

“Chicken Caesar Salads?”

“Sounds good. Why don’t you guys go play or something while I get it ready?”

“We can help.”

“Yeah,” Bucky agreed with a grin as he grabbed the package of chicken out of the fridge. “But then I’d have to pay you out of my check and I’m pretty sure your daddy wouldn’t agree with that. I’m the hired help. You’re my wards until I go home.” He grinned at them when they rolled their eyes. “Go watch TV or something, yeah?”

“Yes, Mr. Barnes.” Alexi nodded then dragged his sister out of the kitchen, ignoring her protests that they should stay and help anyway. 

Bucky smiled to himself as he sat the chicken on the cutting board on the counter then grabbed a skillet to sauté it in off of the hooks on the wall. He’d kill for the copper pots and pans that were hanging there. Figuratively anyway. He sat it on the stove and poured a little bit of oil in the pan, turning the fire on low so it could heat slowly while he sliced the chicken breasts in small pieces. After cutting up the chicken he tossed it into the skillet and sprinkled it with a few spices, salt and pepper. None of which the kids were allergic to. He’d memorized the list of their allergies Natasha had sent him before coming to work. The last thing he needed was to put one of his charges in the hospital. Steve would kick his fucking ass and if Steve didn’t, Natasha would for sure. He would be more careful with these spawn than anyone else’s he’d ever taken care of.

While the chicken was cooking he grabbed three different kinds of lettuce from the fridge and traded the one cutting board for another color coated one that had VEGGIES printed on one end. Bucky laughed. Everything was so organized here. Who needed more than one cutting board? That’s what washing them was for. He switched knives and started shredding the lettuce then remembered he hadn’t gotten a bowl out to mix the salad in and that he’d probably have to make the dressing too. Or not, he found after looking in the fridge and finding a bottle in the door.

***

Steve leaned against the kitchen door, watching Bucky move around the kitchen like he’d spent more than two days in it. He glided effortlessly from cabinet to cabinet, to the stove, to the fridge and back. His movements controlled and precise. He was in his element here. Humming to himself as he made dinner for them. Swaying his hips a bit as he cut a loaf of crusty bread into small chunks and tossed them in olive oil, Italian seasoning, and parmesan to make croutons. He was beautiful. He leaned down to slide the pan into the oven and Steve swallowed as he watched the baggy denim fucking mold to Bucky’s ass and thighs. 

The brunette was still swaying his hips and Steve followed that sway, unable to tear his gaze from it. Damn, he had a nice ass. His thighs though, that’s what drew Steve’s gaze more than the frankly amazing ass. Bucky’s thighs were long and thick with muscle and Steve wanted to know exactly how hard Bucky could squeeze him with them if he were between them. Wanted to know what they felt like wrapped around his hips, around his shoulders, or fuck, even around his head while they did filthy, filthy things. Steve shuddered at the visions running through his head. There were lots of things Steve wanted to do to Bucky.  _ All of them inappropriate;  _ a little voice in the back of his head supplied, making him frown. Especially since Bucky was his kids’ nanny and his employee. That was definitely a breach of propriety of some kind.

Bucky stood and closed the oven door then turned the fire off under the chicken and set it aside to cool. He spun around, smiling to himself, and jolted when he saw Steve just inside the doorway of the kitchen leaning against the doorjamb. He’d showered since Bucky had scared the shit out of both of them and was wearing a navy blue long sleeved shirt that clung to his broad shoulders, pecs, and arms but was baggy everywhere else and another pair of ratty jeans that were covered in paint splatters. His hair was still wet, bangs hanging over his forehead in a way that suggested he hadn’t bothered to comb it. Maybe he’d just run his fingers through it and what Bucky wouldn’t do to run his own fingers through Steve’s hair to see if it felt as soft as it looked.

“Um…I’m sorry I went in your office. The kids heard you boxing. Said maybe you’d want to take a break and join us…them! for dinner. Definitely them. Not me. I mean. I’ll be here too, I guess? Unless you’re done working this evening and then I’ll go home after I finish making dinner? It’s almost done.”

“Relax, Bucky. It’s fine.” Steve smiled gently, hoping it would calm his nervous employee. He really sort of wanted to wrap Bucky in a gentle hug and comb his fingers through his long hair until he settled down. But again, that crossed the boundaries of propriety. Bucky being in his employ meant he couldn’t do that. Couldn’t settle a hand on Bucky’s shoulder or hug him or comb his fingers through his hair or press him up against the stainless steel fridge and kiss him to see if he tasted as sweet as he looked or like the vinegar his words usually held for Steve. 

No, he was stuck watching Bucky stand nervously in his kitchen instead of being able to sing or hum or dance around like he had been before when he thought no one had been watching him. What Steve wouldn’t give to see Bucky act like that around him instead of the weird sort of disdain and now fear. Maybe Steve should send him home for the day.

“Are you okay, Bucky? Do you need to go home? It’s okay if you do. I won’t hold it against you.”

“What? No. I’m fine, Rogers. You just startled me. I was lost in my own head I guess.” Bucky shrugged turning back to the oven to check on the croutons and Steve bit his bottom lip, unable to help his gaze straying right back to Bucky’s ass and thighs as he leaned down.

Jesus. What was he doing? He needed to just go sit with the twins while Bucky finished getting dinner ready for them. He had just wanted to make sure Bucky was okay after the scare and from his episode when he’d first gotten to the house, but when he’d seen Bucky humming and dancing and gliding all over the kitchen he couldn’t help but watch and wonder if someday he might be able to make Bucky that comfortable around him instead of the almost panic or snarky remarks. It shouldn’t really matter he guessed as the little nagging voice reminded him yet again about Bucky being in his employ instead of a potential friend or significant other. Bucky probably thought he was a snob anyway because of the house and hiring a nanny to watch the kids a few hours a day anyway.

Steve shook his head and left the kitchen to go sit with his twins. They were sitting in the living room floor, one on either side of the coffee table, playing Go Fish and betting with pennies. They looked much too serious for their nine years, definitely inherited from Natasha, and he smiled as he sat on the couch.

“Deal me in on the next hand, huh?”

“Buy in is a dollar,” Alexi grinned sliding two more pennies toward the pile. He looked back to his sister and she matched his bet.

“I’m good for it. I got credit with the house.”

“Not tonight you don’t. Put up or shut up.” Alexi grinned again as he said it and Steve snorted.

“All right, let me go sell one of my kidneys. Then I’ll be flush.” He winked at the twins when they giggled then stood and walked to the cabinet where they kept their games and the rolls of pennies for game nights when they picked card games. He grabbed two rolls then walked back to the couch and slapped them down gently on the coffee table. “There. Deal me in next game.”

Alexi nodded sliding more pennies toward the pile then asked his sister for a five. She blinked at him then slid the five out of her hand of cards and he laughed taking it from her and slapping down his last two cards. She groaned starting to count how many pennies she had left. Steve unrolled his pennies and sat them in stacks of ten while Alexi pulled the pile of pennies toward himself then began to shuffle the cards.

Bucky finished making dinner, plating the salads and sitting the bottle of dressing on the table, putting empty glasses beside them and then setting out a pitcher of tea and a pitcher of water from the fridge. He nodded to himself after rechecking the three plates he’d made then walked to the living room where Steve and his kids were apparently gambling. It was for pennies, but still. Apparently he and Natasha had a couple little card sharks on their hands the way Rogers was frowning down at his cards. He pulled a card out of his hand and gave it to Alexa who giggled and slapped two cards down on the table next to a small pile of cards she’d already amassed.

_Go Fish?_ _Who gambled while playing Go Fish?_

“You’re counting cards.” Steve murmured in French. Alexa smiled innocently and Bucky grinned. He didn’t believe that smile for a second.

“I don’t know how to count cards, Daddy. It’s just the way Lexi shuffled the deck.”

“Uh huh.”

“Really, Daddy.”

“Okay, baby.”

Bucky smiled watching them play their game. The two tiny card sharks were beating their father’s ass at Go Fish. Steve was too earnest. He had a really shitty poker face and Bucky would hate to see him actually playing poker or betting more than a few pennies at a time. The blonde would lose his ass at a real card game. He waited until their game was finished before calling them for dinner.

They sat the cards on the table after stacking them then went to wash up. Bucky checked over the table once more then nodded to himself and walked out of the kitchen and began cleaning up their card game He put the deck of cards back in its box then rerolled the pennies back in their wrappers and carried them back over to the game cabinet.

Steve walked back into the living room to see that Bucky had cleared away their game and was staring out the window. The setting sun bathed him in a pinkish orange glow and Steve thought the brunette had never looked more beautiful than with that fiery halo surrounding him. Of course he’d seen the man exactly twice so it wasn’t hard, but even still Steve didn’t think Bucky could ever look more beautiful than he did in that moment.

The moment ended when his heathens thundered down the steps and into the kitchen. He turned after them quickly, hoping Bucky hadn’t caught him staring. He’d be mortified. Even more so than when he had frightened the brunette earlier. He walked into the kitchen to see only three plates set on the kitchen table. The rest of the salad was in a bowl in the middle surrounded by the pitchers of tea and water from the fridge and salad dressing. The croutons were in a bowl next to the salad as well as some shredded parmesan and the plate of diced sautéed chicken.

Was Bucky not going to eat with them? Why wouldn’t he eat? Steve turned to go back into the living room to ask Bucky if he was going to have dinner with them and saw that Bucky had pilfered cleaning supplies out of the hall closet and was busy dusting the tables. Steve bit his bottom lip as he watched the oblivious brunette wipe down tables. Manners demanded he at least ask Bucky if he wanted to join them for dinner. His head warned him that he should probably just leave Bucky alone and let him clean. His stupid heart, which had no business getting involved at all this early in the game, not that there was a game, kind of wanted Bucky to stay forever. He looked…right. Content. A level of domesticity that Steve didn’t really expect from the scruffy unkempt appearance. He shook his head with a sigh. He shouldn’t be thinking about domesticity. Not with Bucky in the picture at least.

He’d ask if he wanted to join them for dinner. He could hear his mother’s voice in his ear griping at him because he hadn’t asked yet.

“Hey, Bucky?” The brunette jolted like he’d been shocked, dropping the dust cloth to the floor, and Steve sighed heavily. “Do you want to join us for dinner? You cooked, only seems right that you get to eat too.”

“I was just gonna grab a burger or something on the way home later.”

“Buck, come on. You cooked. Come eat with us. The kids’ll appreciate it. They like you.”

How was Bucky supposed to sit across the table from Steve and keep being tacky to him in front of the kids? He couldn’t really. He would have to be polite and engaging or else he’d be setting a bad example for the twins. He didn’t think he could do that without falling a little bit more in lust with the Adonis that was currently pouting at him. That pout should be illegal. It reminded Bucky of a golden retriever puppy he’d had a kid that always begged for table scraps. Steve’s blue eyes shone pitifully, perfect bottom lip jutted out, Bucky wanted to kiss him. Or punch him. Rogers had to know how unfair that stupid (adorable) pout was.  _ Ugh! _

“I guess I can eat now,” Bucky mumbled, fighting a smile when Steve immediately lit up, bouncing on his feet like a child who had gotten their way. So unfair. “I’ll go wash up.”

“Okay, I’ll have the kids wait for you.”

“Don’t worry about it, Steve. It’s fine. They’re probably starving. I always was after school and homework.”

“You’re sure?”

“Yeah, it’s fine Rogers.” Bucky picked up his cleaning supplies and carried them with him as he walked out of the room.

Steve smiled after Bucky for a second then walked into the kitchen to find his heathens already piling chicken, croutons, and cheese on the salads Bucky had plated for them. “Bucky’s going to be joining us for dinner so save him some, yeah?”

“Okay, Daddy.”

Bucky shook his head as he put the cleaning supplies back in the hall closet. He really shouldn’t stay and eat with them. He didn’t need that kind of temptation and he knew watching Steve interact with his kids would be the killing blow on Bucky’s resolve not to get involved with the man. He shut the door quietly then sighed and started to slowly make his way to the kitchen. When he stood in the doorway he stopped to watch Steve and the kids talking about their days, about homework and kids at school. The summer programs the twins’ school was thinking about doing this year. Taekwondo, piano, cooking and art classes. Things they already did at home except play the piano. Bucky could piano though. He’d learned when he was a kid. He honestly wasn’t surprised the twins did all of that. Not with whom their father and birthmother were. He wondered if he should tell Steve he could play the piano, but decided not to. Not right now at least.

He really shouldn’t be here right now. His place wasn’t with Steve and the twins while they talked about their extracurricular activities. He’d already done what he was supposed to do. Helping the twins with their homework and making dinner. He’d yet to clean up properly, doing the dishes he’d dirtied, but Steve could handle that. Probably. Most likely. He was a grown assed man; surely he knew how to do the dishes? But Steve probably had more work to do after dinner and Bucky hadn’t thought to ask to make sure he wasn’t still needed.

Fuck it, he thought, bailing on their invitation to dinner. They didn’t need him making things more awkward than they already were. He started to turn and walk out without making an excuse then shook his head. He actually sort of did need the money and while he had no issues, well, few issues being rude to Steve he didn’t want to be rude to the blonde’s spawn. And anyway, Steve had already tried to get him to go home twice and didn’t seem upset about it. Bucky tapped on the doorjamb and smiled weakly when they all three turned to look at him.

“I’m uh…not feeling all that great actually. I’m just gonna go ahead and go if that’s okay?”

Steve nodded with an understanding smile and the kids pouted. “Sure, if you need to, Bucky.” The brunette nodded with a weak smile.

“Yeah. I’ll um…I’ll be back tomorrow though.”

“That’s fine.” Steve excused himself from his children, starting to stand to walk Bucky out but the brunette waved him away and turned to rush out the door, closing it behind him with a decisive click.

“Is Mr. Barnes okay, Daddy?”

“Yeah, sweetheart. He’s okay. Eat your dinner.” Steve really hoped Bucky was okay. Maybe tomorrow would be a better day for the brunette.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for the lovely comments and to everyone who read, subscribed, gave kudos, and bookmarked. <3
> 
> Again this is completely unbeta'd so if you'd like to beta for me I'd send cookies or if you see any errors that I missed let me know. Thanks!


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Nine days is close enough to two weeks right?
> 
> I'm posting early again because I have a scary doctor's appointment Monday morning. One scary point because I hopefully will find out about my surgery and another scary point because my new doctor is hot as hell and I am socially inept on the best of days. Dude is so hot. *whimpers*

Bucky took off walking down the sidewalk. He’d decided to walk home instead of taking the subway to punish himself for being stupid. It was only like an hour’s walk anyway and he was probably the most dangerous person on the street right now so he didn’t have to worry about getting mugged. Not when he could kill a man with his pinkie. Okay, so he hadn’t actually tried to kill anyone with his pinkie, but he’d thought about it a lot. Knew the proper stress points and whatnot. He was also pretty sure he’d seen Natasha kill someone with her pinkie finger once. He hadn’t been able to prove it and she refused to answer him which was sort of like answering him, but even so he couldn’t be 100% positive she’d done it. His gut told him she had though. He could totally kill someone with an ink pen though. He’d done it before when almost getting his ass kicked on an assignment before.

Tomorrow would be a better day. He was sure of it. He was going to get a good night’s sleep. He was going to wake up late and play video games for a little while and then he’d get ready to go to Steve’s to take care of his tiny heathens. Maybe he’d even tell Steve he could play piano, but that would mean Steve would know he’d eavesdropped on him and the twins. He hadn’t exactly meant to. He’d just been watching a sweet moment between Steve and the kids and hadn’t been able to tear his eyes away from it.

Stupidly torn over it, Bucky made his way home, stopping to grab a burger that he’d wound up being unable to eat and handed off to a homeless man along with the last $20 out of his wallet. He needed it more than Bucky did anyway. If anything Bucky would probably scavenge through the cabinets until he found out where Natasha had hidden his Coffee Nut M&M’s and have himself a miniature pity party. Maybe he’d even pull out the Death by Chocolate ice cream.

Or he’d use his emergency credit card and go to the grocery store and buy vanilla ice cream, bananas, and whipped cream then go to the liquor store and buy a bottle of 99 Bananas and a bottle of Bacardi 151 and make a milkshake. Or he could save his emergency credit card for an actual emergency like an adult. He huffed, shaking his head and continued his way home. Adulting was not anywhere near as fun as what he’d been led to believe when he was a kid. Lying assholes.

***

Steve sighed as he took out that night’s scraps to put in the compost. He’d already put away the left overs to take for his lunch the next day, done the dishes, locked all the windows and doors, and turned off the lights. The twins had been read a bedtime story and were sacked out in their bedroom. The door left cracked open like always. He dumped the little bucket in the compost bin then rinsed it out with the water hose and took it back inside to shove under the kitchen sink until they used it again.

He still had to go back into his office and finish sending his emails for the day. He didn’t want to. Wanted to be irresponsible for a little bit. His ma would be snapping at him with her heavy Irish accent or boxing his ears if she knew. Probably both. ‘You’ve got responsibilities now, Steven. You can’t go fucking off whenever you want anymore. You’ve two darling angels to look after now.’ Even if it was just postponing a few emails. She’d definitely have something to say about it.

He groaned nodding along with his mother’s nonexistent words in his ears as he made his way to into his office. Maybe he’d just take the laptop to bed with him, he thought, when he remembered the incident that had happened with Bucky earlier. He’d been so shocked when he heard Bucky calling for him that he’d just spun around with his guard still up and frightened him. Frightened himself too if he was being honest. Bucky had jerked back a couple steps with his hands up in front of himself defensively looking more shocked than Steve had been for not having realized Bucky was even in the room. He was surprised the brunette hadn’t taken off right then and there. Maybe he hadn’t because they’d both been military. Had both been S.H.I.E.L.D. and come back from living that kind of life. Though from what Natasha said sometimes Bucky still went on missions so he hadn’t quite left that world behind. Not as much as Steve had.

The blonde grabbed his laptop from his desk and carried it with him into his bedroom, dropping it onto the bed before changing into a pair of loose cotton pajama pants and shucking his shirt off. He tossed his clothes haphazardly toward the hamper, not really caring if they made it or not then shut his bedroom light off and climbed onto the bed to finish his emails before he fell asleep.

He loved his life, loved his children, and that he had the ability to care for them as well as he did, but sometimes he fucking hated adulting. Especially when it included having to repeat himself time and time again to his students.

***

Bucky trudged to the door of the house and opened it, falling with it when it swung open and nearly brained himself on the wall. He grumbled under his breath as he shuffled further into the apartment closing the door behind himself. He immediately fell onto the couch, kicking his boots off and glancing at the post-it on the coffee table. Natasha had gone on another mission then. He lifted the yellow square and blinked at it, trying to decipher the emoji laden message that she constantly used. A skull, a gun, a bomb, a sailboat, an explosion, and a smiley. He snorted, if he hadn’t been so tired he’d have realized what it was immediately. He had stacks of post-its she’d given him with similar messages printed on them. It was cute. She was the only agent he knew that left messages by emoji. Probably she’d kill him if she knew he thought it was cute.

He sat the note back on the table then took a steadying breath and pushed himself off of the couch to go in search of his stash of M&M’s that Natasha hid every time she found them just because it drove him crazy. She found them nearly as fast as he hid them though. He didn’t doubt she used cameras and bugs to find out where he’d hidden them. He’d found and destroyed a few before she’d told him they were hers and part of her security system. She didn’t put any in his bedroom, or at least not anymore, but had put alarms on the windows just in case someone would try to slip through. Even when he hid his chocolate in his room though she still found it. Granted there wasn’t a lot of places to hide it, but still. A man’s chocolate was sacred and she needed to not.

He started in the kitchen because she hadn’t hidden his candy there lately and twenty minutes, a trip up onto the kitchen table, and pilfering through the air vent later, he was sat on the couch wearing only his boxers and demolishing his Coffee Nut M&M’s and Death by Chocolate ice cream while _Monty Python and the Holy Grail_ played on the TV. This was definitely a chocolate overdose night after the day he’d had.

He’d made a complete fool of himself because Art Stripper Steve had opened the door looking like a painting god and had had those dorky as hell glasses on. He was glad Steve hadn’t looked him over from head to toe like he had the day before. There was no hiding that erection if he had. He’d keep making a fool of himself he figured if he kept working for Steve. But if Steve opened the door wearing the stupid cardigan combo again Bucky would be safe. Cardigans were so not sexy. Well, not unless Steve was wearing a cardigan and nothing else. Bucky frowned into his ice cream as he envisioned it and shook his head with a snort and a giggle. Nope, still stupid. Of course if he actually saw Steve nude then he might have a better idea of what to picture. So far all he had was Steve standing with his back toward him with no pants or underwear and a cardigan that ended right above his ass.

His perfect, perfect, ass. Bucky whimpered shoving another spoon of ice cream and M&M’s in his mouth. Steve really did have the most perfect ass that Bucky had ever seen. Perfect little globes he wanted his hands and mouth all over. Like a peach. Round and juicy. He groaned picturing all the little licks and nips and hickeys he wanted to leave on Steve’s pale skin and dropped the carton of ice cream on his lap with a hiss at the cold against his dick to calm himself down.

“Serves you right, fucker.” He glared down at his lap and stabbed his spoon into the carton with a wince. “You’re going to get me fired. Or make me have to quit.” He groaned scrubbing his hands over his face and dropped his head back against the couch. “You’re talking to your dick. And yourself. Awesome.” He wished he’d gotten the stuff to make his liquored up milkshake instead of being an adult. Well, as much of an adult as he ever was.

He finished off his carton of ice cream and two bags of M&M’s before realizing that he was either going to have a heart attack or never sleep again if he ate any more of them than what he already had. In the end he told himself to fuck it and ate another bag. His life was crap right now anyway. He was well aware he was being melodramatic. Sometimes though, you just gotta be melodramatic.

And sometimes at four in the morning when you can’t sleep because you’ve jacked yourself up on chocolate and caffeine you rub one out thinking about your impossibly hot Art Stripper boss. Because apparently Bucky could keep an erection even while holding ice cream or a bag of frozen peas he would never look at the same way again over his dick.

***

“I masturbated over you last night. To the image of you wearing nothing but one of those dorky cardigans,” was what Bucky absolutely did not say the next day at work. He didn’t say anything at all to Steve in fact. Mostly because he knew he’d be stammering, especially after his caffeine and chocolate fueled masturbation marathon. Instead when the gorgeous blonde had opened the door wearing his glasses, a navy cardigan with a red t-shirt under it, and a pair of blue jeans Bucky had blushed crimson at the unbidden memories from earlier that day, he never had gone to sleep, and slid past Steve and straight into the kitchen where he knew the twins were waiting on him to help with their homework.

“Mr. Barnes?”

Bucky looked up from Alexi’s reading booklet and blinked at Steve where he was stood in the doorway of the kitchen with his hands in his pockets, inadvertently framing the dick Bucky had spent so much time fantasizing about. His eyes trailed down without meaning to and he bit back a whimper then cleared his throat and looked up to meet Steve’s eyes. His beautiful eyes that Bucky imagined would darken to match his cardigan when he was aroused.

“Um…yeah?”

“Will you stay after dinner tonight? I think there’s some things we need to discuss.”

“Oh.” Oh, shit. There went the lusty goodness that was highly inappropriate anyway. Bucky was fired. He was gone. Steve was done with his shit. It had only technically been two days. That…well…it wasn’t a _new_ record. Bucky had gotten fired in the first hour of a job once, but even so he thought he was doing pretty good with the kids. Was there something he was supposed to have done and didn’t do? Something he did and wasn’t supposed to? “Is there something wrong?” See? He could Adult when he had to.

Steve looked panicked himself for a moment, quickly shaking his head. “No. No, of course not. Everything’s fine.”

Bucky hid his sigh of relief and waited for an explanation. When Steve only stared at him he did sigh this time, loudly, and flicked the booklet in his hand with his thumb. “If that’s all?” It was a dismissal and he knew it, but still. He couldn’t take Steve staring at him like that. Like he was something confusing that needed to be figured out. Maybe he was though.

“You’ll stay after?”

“Yes.”

“Okay.” Steve nodded then turned to walk away, tapping the knuckles of one hand on the doorjamb on his way out.

“Daddy’s weird today,” Alexi noted staring after his father.

Alexa rolled her eyes. “He’s always weird.”

“Back to work kiddos.”

Alexi leaned closer over the table to see his booklet better and began to read out loud. Bucky telling him it might help him understand the passage better that way. He listened with one ear as he contemplated what to make for dinner later after homework was finished.

This was totally an order-in for dinner day too. Steve could suck it. He was going to be busy in his office grading papers or practicing a new stripping routine or whatever it was he did when not teaching. Maybe if Bucky ordered from that one Italian place Natasha liked so much Steve couldn’t bitch about what the kids ate for dinner. It wasn’t that terrible for you if you didn’t go crazy when ordering and he’d make sure to order a salad to go with it.

After finishing what little homework the twins had he ordered their dinner and then went out to the backyard with them to check out the small garden they kept. Alexi and Alexa were telling him about what they had planted and when it would be ready to pick. Their plans for a chicken coop in the back corner of the yard. Raising pullets and getting eggs from them. Having pine shavings in the floor of the coop, something called a deep litter method that they’d only have to clean out a few times a year and would help keep the hens warm in winter. Apparently pine was better than straw or hay because mites hid in the straw and it would be near impossible to get rid of them safely. And they could put the litter in the compost bin for fertilizer for their garden. All of it was moot though if they couldn’t convince their father to buy them the coop and the chicks. He wanted them to wait until summer and they’d talk about it again. So hopefully in a few weeks they’d have baby chickens and in a few months from then they’d start getting eggs. And that was only if they could decide on which breed of chickens they wanted. Alexa wanted something called Austra Whites and Alexi wanted Buff Orpingtons. Bucky had no clue what the hell either breed of chicken was. The only chicken he’d ever seen that wasn’t already cooked or fixing to be cooked was Forghorn Leghorn from the old cartoons when he’d been a kid.

They told him everything he’d never really thought he needed to know about chickens and he could see Natasha’s influence on them. Their need to gather all the intel they could on the subject. And maybe even Steve’s, Bucky couldn’t honestly say since he didn’t know the blonde, but he knew that Steve had worked with Natasha and had been military. It was nice to see how much thought and work they’d put into their project. He hoped Steve agreed to let them do it. The twins were highly responsible and he knew it was because they’d grown up with a military family, but part of it was definitely just the way Steve was. Responsible, commanding, but loving to his children, taking care of them and somehow managing to handle all the responsibilities that had been handed to him. He seemed like one of those mythical people that actually knew how to Adult. Art Stripper Steve was a unicorn.

That wasn’t to say the kids didn’t have time to be kids. They obviously did. He could see it in the worn but loved swing set and play house. A jungle gym and other toys scattered through the backyard but still neatly. The backyard was its own little world just for the twins and Bucky was glad that they had that. That even though their family was made of former military and former and active S.H.I.E.L.D. agents they still got to have that security and life and fun. They got to be normal children. He finally understood why Natasha would never be Mom. Besides the fact that she had only been a surrogate for Steve. He understood why she could never put herself in their lives more than what she did. Even from just three days with the twins he knew he’d do whatever he could to protect them.

***

Steve was sitting in the wide seat at the large bay window in his office, pencil scratching across paper quickly. Hoping to capture what he’d seen perfectly. The twins had Bucky by the hands, dragging him around the backyard and showing him everything. The garden, their toys, play house, swing set, the jungle gym. The corner where they hoped to have their little chicken coop one day.

He hadn’t meant to spy on them. Had only gone to look out of the window when he’d heard the twins’ excited chatter and loud giggles. He’d found them crouched over the garden, pointing to the plants and naming them off for Bucky. Bucky was listening raptly with a smile on his face. One of his perfect happy smiles that made his eyes crinkle. A smile that Steve would probably never get to have directed at him. He’d been unable to tear his eyes away from that smile, standing at the window for longer than he should have, feeling like a creeper for watching Bucky so closely even while he told himself he was just keeping an eye out on his kids.

Steve wanted to capture it on paper so had grabbed his sketchpad and a pencil and sat at the window seat, smiling and putting pencil to paper. He sketched them at the garden, standing by the jungle gym. Going down the slide one after another. All three of them laughing happily. It was sweet. Innocent. Something he knew one day would end for his children, but for now it was enough. The last sketch, the best one in his opinion, was of his twins and Bucky laid out in the yard staring up at the clouds and laughing as they pointed out shapes. He sketched a tiny stalk of flowers in the corner; a Hybrid Delphinium, for fun, lightness, and levity. He resolutely didn’t think about the fact that it also stood for ardent attachment and that he meant it for Bucky as much as he did for the twins. He barely knew the man, hadn’t had more than a couple conversations with him. If you could call sniping at each other conversation.

They eventually walked back toward he house and he flipped the sketchpad shut and moved back to his desk to finish working and hoped they hadn’t noticed him watching them at any point. If they did they didn’t act like it, but if they had seen him and noticed how long he’d been watching he couldn’t pass it off as having just peeked out at them to make sure they were okay. He groaned clicking through the files he’d downloaded from his students trying to find a draft that didn’t look terribly boring or difficult to read. Some of his students had poor writing skills and he wanted to bash his head against his desk while he tried to translate what the hell they meant.

He still had to figure out how to ask Bucky about his episodes. He still wasn’t sure to call them, but they seemed like panic attacks or something close. He didn’t want to embarrass the man. Or piss him off. Wanted to make whatever accommodations he could to help him, but didn’t know how to bring it up. He’d tried to call Natasha, but she’d refused the call and then sent him a text that was made completely from emojis from a number he didn’t recognize, but knew it was her all the same. She was fond of burner phones. She was gone on a mission somewhere involving a boat and couldn’t talk. Couldn’t let him know the right way to talk to Bucky. So he was on his own. He still had until after dinner and having the kids get ready for bed. That gave him an hour or so to figure out how to delicately talk to his nanny. Although maybe he didn’t have to. Bucky hadn’t panicked today. He had only flushed a spectacular shade of red that Steve had more often than not sported on his own face. Maybe Bucky had only needed a couple days to situate himself.

***

Bucky finished putting their dinner dishes in the dish washer then sat the bucket that was to be carried to the compost bin by the door so Steve could take it out after he’d eaten. Bucky had put Steve’s dinner in the microwave to keep until he came down from planning his stripper routine. Grading paintings. Whatever it was he actually did. Bucky still put his money on stripping. Not that he had a lot of money right this minute. Probably he had like $20 in the bank to last him until he got paid. He had savings but he hated to dip into them. Not unless it was an emergency. Another one of those Adulting things he had issues with.

“Mr. Barnes?”

Bucky turned to Alexa with a gentle smile. “What is it?”

“Is Daddy going to fire you? Me and Lexi told him we like you. And you’re good at science. Daddy’s not really that great at it and we have our end of the year Science Faire in two weeks.”

“I don’t think he is, Alexa. He just wanted to talk to me before I go home tonight.”

“If he does I’ll tell Auntie Nat and she’ll make him hire you back. Daddy always does what she says.”

Bucky snorted out a laugh. That wasn’t surprising in the least. Natasha had this one look that only involved a blank stare and a raised brow that always had people scrambling to do what she wanted them to do. He’d had ample experience with that look over the years. She was the one person he was truly terrified of. He knew she’d never actually kill him. Injure gravely maybe, but not kill him. “A lot of people do what your Auntie Nat says.”

“You know Auntie Nat?” Alexa grinned looking so much like her daddy and Bucky couldn’t help but smile back.

“Yep. I used to work with her.”

“Daddy did too. Before he got us.”

“I figured he did.”

“But now he’s just a boring old teacher.” Alexa frowned at that and Bucky laughed again then sent her along after her brother to go play so he could finish cleaning up until Steve came and got them for bed.

So Steve definitely used to be an agent. Bucky had figured that he had been with how close he was with Natasha. She didn’t have many people she liked, even fewer she considered friends. How close were she and Rogers that she’d volunteered to carry his spawn? He knew they had to be tight, but just how tight? Had they had a relationship before? Natasha usually stayed far away from romantic relationships because she didn’t like having to lie, no matter how good she was at it for work, but if Rogers had been an agent had they been together during that time?

Was Bucky’s teenage angst worthy crush pointless? He had thought Steve had been checking him out that first day, but now he wasn’t sure. Probably he’d just been looking him over and trying to decide if Bucky was going to rob him or kidnap his children instead of taking care of them like he’d been hired to do. It didn’t particularly matter in the end. He wouldn’t fuck this job up over a crush. He couldn’t stand the idea that the kids might get hurt if he and Steve did anything. Which they wouldn’t do anything. Not as long as Bucky worked for him. It was flatly against Bucky’s rules and this job was only temporary. Four more weeks and he’d never see any of them again. It sucked because he was already attached to the tiny redheaded heathens he’d been taking care of, but he’d get over it. Throw himself back at Natasha’s mercy and find another mission to go on. Maybe he’d even hire back on and be a fulltime agent again if he got desperate enough. He really, really, hoped he didn’t get that desperate.

“Mr. Barnes?”

Bucky jolted, turning toward Steve and saw him leaning against the doorjamb. It seemed to be his favorite part of the kitchen. He was forever hanging out there.

“You got something going on with the doorway or what?” He didn’t mean to snap at Steve that time, but it was too late to take it back now.

Steve blinked then huffed out an awkward laugh. “I was trying not to scare you again. Seems that’s all I manage to do. You looked kind of lost.”

“What did you want to talk to me about?” Bucky leaned against the counter, crossing his arms over his chest defensively. He really hoped he wasn’t about to get fired even though Steve had told him earlier that everything was fine.

“I um…” Steve trailed off raking one hand through already tousled hair. “I just…well, I was wondering…you have panic issues? I think. And I was just wondering if you needed me to do anything to make this more comfortable for you?” He was fucking up so bad. That wasn’t how he wanted to word things. He was trying to be delicate about it, damn it!

Bucky blanched at what Steve had said. Oh shit. Oh, fuck. He’d noticed, but Bucky hadn’t been having panic attacks like he did sometimes. Not the ones that were entwined with his past, with his time in the Army and his time as an agent. No, Bucky had panicked because Steve was the most beautiful man he’d ever seen. It was fine. He’d get over it.

“It’s fine like it is, Steve. Really. I just…need time.” He did. Time to get over his crush which he would do this weekend. One way or the other. Maybe he’d go dancing and find some other hot blonde to spend time with and get his mind off of the blonde Adonis.

“You’re sure? I mean…you seem to only panic when I’m around. Is it something I did?”

“What? No.” Had Steve been watching him that closely? And he hadn’t noticed it? Holy shit he was fucked. “It’s fine. If that’s all?” Steve nodded, looking a little put out, and Bucky pushed away from the counter with his foot against the cabinet door and walked out of the kitchen. “I put your dinner in the microwave. I’ll be back tomorrow.”

“Oh, okay. Thank you, Bucky.”

“It’s my job, Rogers. No need to thank me.” With that Bucky walked out of the house closing the door behind him silently, leaving Steve staring after him despondently.

“I fucked it up. I knew I’d fuck it up.”

Steve sighed heavily and turned to grab the plate from the microwave. He wasn’t really in the mood to eat now. He’d probably just mortally offended Bucky. He lifted the piece of foil that covered it and smiled when he saw the chicken parmesan from Nat’s favorite restaurant and a salad with a little container of balsamic dressing sitting next to it. He put the foil back down then moved to put the plate in the fridge. He’d eat it later. After he figured out how to apologize to Bucky for managing to fuck up so badly.

“Daddy! Come read us a story please,” Alexi yelled from his and Alexa’s bedroom and Steve smiled softly wondering just how much longer his babies would want him to read them a story before bed. They were already growing up so quickly. He left the kitchen and lumbered up the stairs, grabbing _Grimm’s Complete Fairy Tales_ again and flinging himself down on the pushed together twin beds. Alexi and Alexa giggled snuggling against him, one on either side, and he flipped the book open to a random page and began to read.

It wasn’t until later, almost three in the morning, when Steve had to be awake in less than three hours to get his children and himself ready for school that he figured out what he was going to do to apologize to the brunette. Probably it was a little crazy, but Bucky seemed crazy about the twins so Steve figured it would turn out okay. He’d give Bucky the sketch he’d drawn of he and twins laying on the grass and watching the clouds. If Bucky noticed the tiny flower stalk in the corner, he probably wouldn’t know what it meant anyway so it would be okay. Wouldn’t it? He just had to scan it to his laptop first.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments give me life! Life I tell you, life! *fades into the night* <3


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Let's just say that further updates will be approximately two weeks apart for now. Patience is not my virtue.

When Bucky got to work the next day, instead of Steve opening the door for him it was the twins. They both grinned excitedly and dragged him into the kitchen. Where the hell was Steve? And why the hell had he let the twins answer the door? Didn’t he know how dangerous that was? Granted Bucky might be the only one to show up at the same time every day, but even still Steve shouldn’t get complacent and just assume Bucky was the one knocking on the door. Yeah, the twins were old enough to see who it was first, but still. He’d be talking to Steve about it later.

When Bucky sat at the kitchen table Alexa pushed a piece of paper toward him. He blinked at the yellow sticky note.  _ I’m sorry if I overstepped, Steve. _ Okay, what the hell? He looked down at the paper and saw a sketch of him and the twins. They were laying out in the backyard staring up at the sky and pointing at the clouds. 

So Steve had been watching them. But had he been watching the twins? Or had he been watching Bucky and why? If he was watching the twins then that was fine, he’d be afraid for Steve’s sense of comfort if he didn’t, but if he was watching Bucky was it because he’d panicked before? Or was it something else? What other reason could it be? He looked over the sketch again and smiled weakly when he saw how happy all three of them looked. Alexi and Alexa had their heads angled toward each other, Bucky was lying next to them pointing up at a cloud shaped like a duck. All of them with smiles on their faces. His eyes caught a tiny flower thing in one corner, hey sue him, he didn’t know what a flower was unless it was a rose, tulip, or daisy, and figured it was Steve’s weird little signature. All artists had some special signature right?

All in all, it was a cute sketch and he appreciated the apology. He honestly had just hoped to avoid another conversation with Steve about it, about anything really, and had planned on avoiding him for the rest of forever anyway. Because every time he saw Art Stripper Steve he wanted to climb him like a tree and that was so unprofessional.

“Do you like Daddy’s drawing,” Alexa asked breaking him from his thoughts. Bucky nodded.

“Yeah, sweet pea. It’s really good. I’ll tell him thank you before I leave.” He sat the sketch aside where it wouldn’t get messed up then turned back to the twins. “What’s on the agenda today?”

“Science,” Alexi yelled throwing a fist up into the air. Alexa rolled her eyes at her brother’s exuberance and Bucky grinned.

“I only have three math problems. After we’re done can we go outside and play until dinner?”

“Sure. What do you guys want for dinner?”

“Tomato soup and grilled cheese,” Alexi said after a moment. His sister nodded quickly.

“I can do that if you’ve got the stuff for it.”

“We do. Daddy always keeps cans of soup for us.”

“Canned? Ugh. I can make it work.” God. Canned? Might as well be making them eat dirt. “Alright, let’s get this show on the road.”

“What show,” Alexa asked with a confused frown. So much like her daddy.

“It’s an expression. It means let’s get to work.”

“Oh, okay.”

Alexa finished her math problems without asking for help and Bucky went over her paper to make sure she’d gotten them all right. After putting a check by the few she’d gotten wrong he handed the paper back to her then went back to helping Alexi with his science. This lesson was covering atoms. Protons, neutrons, electrons, nuclei. Things that he remembered what they were called, but not exactly what they did. He skimmed over the lesson until he parsed what he needed to know then handed the book back and answered Alexi’s questions to the best of his ability.

Homework was soon finished and he watched the twins with a small smile as they packed up their books, papers, and pencils, putting them back into their rucksacks and hanging them back up by the door like they did every day. He liked how organized they kept things, but seriously, where was the mess? 

When he’d been their ages he had been lucky to be able to find his rucksack much less his homework. There were more important things to worry about. Like playing outside with his friends or at their houses playing the Super Nintendo and the Mario games, Primal Rage, Killer Instinct, Mortal Kombat and ClayFighter. His favorite game had been Primal Rage purely for the fight at the beach where if you and a second player did it just right you could pick up one of the humans with your dinosaur and bat them back and forth. A volley ball net would eventually appear as long as you didn’t drop the tiny flailing person. It was fun. He wondered if Steve had ever played any of those games. He was the right age for them. He was nerdy and artsy though so probably not. Maybe Super Mario though. Even nerdy artsy people could play that one.

He chuckled letting the twins lead him out to the backyard and couldn’t help but turn and glimpse up at the windows to see if Steve was watching them again as they walked across the yard toward the swing set. The twins hopped onto the swings and Bucky grinned walking behind them.

“Want a push?”

The twins both cheered loudly and he laughed placing a gentle hand on each of their backs and pushing.

“I wanna go so high I can see the roof!”

“Your father would kill me. Then bring me back from the dead just to fire me and then kill me again. I’m pretty sure.” And there were definitely better ways to die than by Angry Dad. He’d had enough experience when angry dads when he’d been a horny teenager. Experimenting with daughters and then curious sons. He’d always had more fun with their sons. It hadn’t taken him long at all to figure out that he definitely had more fun with their sons than he had with their daughters.

“Daddy, wouldn’t do that, Mr. Barnes. Auntie Tasha would beat him up.”

“Would she?”

“Yep. She told Daddy he had to hire you because she knew you’d be the best one to take care of us besides her and Daddy because you secretly love kids and want to have a bunch of Mini Buckies running around.”

“Really?”

“Yep. Me and Lexi heard her talking to Daddy about it.”

“You eavesdropped on your father and Auntie Tasha?”

“We didn’t eavesdrop. We listened in over the phone,” Alexi told him, turning to face Bucky enough that he could roll his eyes at him.

Bucky laughed, shaking his head and pushing the swings higher. High enough that the twins squealed and giggled, both of them stretching up to see if they could see the roof. So long as neither of them flew from the swings they’d probably be okay. He was going to have to have a talk with Natasha though. She needed to stop telling everyone his secrets. Yeah, he adored children. Kittens and puppies too. That didn’t mean she needed to tell everyone. He had a reputation to uphold damn it. They hadn’t called him the Winter Soldier because of his profound love for tiny cuddly animals and babies after all.

***

Steve smiled to himself watching Bucky pushing the twins on the swing set. He tensed in worry though when the twins were swinging high enough that the chains were nearly even with the top bar of the frame. His kids flying back and forth quickly like violent redheaded pendulums. Giggling and screaming the whole time. He wanted to rush out there and make them stop. Slow them down to less insane speed and heights. He’d ruin their fun though. But, a little voice whispered, they’d be safe. 

He had issues with the whole fun VS safe thing. He always had which was why when he’d been their age he’d broken his arm falling out of a tree because he wanted to see how high his tiny body could climb. He’d made it halfway up the 20-foot-tall tree before hauling himself up onto a dead branch and falling to what he was sure was his death. He’d gotten his ears boxed, a trip to the emergency room, a kiss on the forehead, and then ice cream. So it hadn’t been all that bad, but even so he didn’t want his babies hurt. He knew he couldn’t protect them from everything, but this he could protect them from.

He sat his sketch pad down and was just slipping his fingers under the edge of the window to raise it when Bucky caught the twins, one under each arm and flew out with them when they swung up, dragging his feet on the ground to slow them when they swung back down. “Jesus!” Steve’s heart was racing, mostly from panic but a little bit from lust too because  _ holy fucking shit _ Bucky was strong. And he looked so good with the twins. They were all three smiling and laughing, sand from under the swings flying through the air as Bucky’s feet dragged over it. Clouds of it lingering and falling. Covering all three of them in the silica. He was going to have to hose them down with the water hose before letting them into the house.

And why the hell had Bucky suddenly jumped on them like that? Had he seen Steve sitting at the window? Had he seen his panic? Or was he just that much of a dork that he wanted to swing too and decided to jump on the kids to do it? There was no fucking telling and he was pretty sure Bucky wouldn’t bring it up even if he had seen Steve staring out the window, sketching as he watched them. It was going to become an issue at some point, Steve knew. He’d never admit to watching them, but well, he sort of already had by leaving the previous day’s sketch for Bucky on the kitchen table with an apology post-it note stuck to it. Still, he was supposed to be working, but when he heard the kids laugh, without him much less, he couldn’t help but go to the window to see why. To watch them having fun for a few minutes. To sketch those little moments of happiness. The smiles on all three of their faces, but even more, on Bucky’s. Even if they didn’t include him right now.

He knew Bucky would close off if he saw him watching or if he’d gone out to join them. He always did when Steve walked into the room. The blonde just wished he knew why. He knew he couldn’t make everyone like him. He’d always known. He still hated it sometimes though. Especially now. Especially because it was Bucky who apparently was one of Natasha’s friends and he’d never even known about him. Especially because Bucky was gorgeous and so sweet with the twins. He was so good with them, like Natasha had told Steve he would be, but why the hell did Bucky seem to hate him? Maybe he didn’t hate him, but he certainly seemed to dislike him a great deal.

Steve sighed with relief once the twins jumped down from their swings and ran to the monkey bars. At least the eight foot drop wouldn’t kill them like the swings flying as high as the bar across the top would if they fell from them.

He shook his head and sketched out the scene before him. The twins hanging from the monkey bars on their play set while Bucky waited to catch them in case they fell. All three of them with huge smiles on their faces and laughing loudly as the twins played Chicken. He added an Anthurium in the bottom corner for happiness then sat aside his sketchpad and went back to his desk to actually work so he could be done in time to get his little demon babies in bed and read them a story. He heard them laughing again and sighed mournfully because he wanted to be out there with them. Sometimes Adulting sucked.

***

“All right, brats, go get washed up and chill for a bit. I’ll make dinner.”

The twins scrambled down from the monkey bars and Bucky watched them with a laugh as they ran screaming into the house, pushing and shoving each other out of the way in order to get to the door first. Alexa finally managed to move Alexi out of the way and ran through the door with a victorious crowing that had Bucky laughing and shaking his head as he slowly made his way back to the house.

He looked up at the window to Steve’s office, expecting the blonde to be sitting there and finding him absent. Was it wrong that he felt disappointed that Steve hadn’t been watching them? Steve had definitely watched them before as evidenced by the sketch he’d left with his apology Post-it note. Bucky still wasn’t sure if it was a good thing or not. Probably Steve was just paranoid and making sure Bucky wasn’t a creepy weirdo. In the end, Bucky only shrugged to himself because it really didn’t matter if Steve watched them or not, and walked into the kitchen to dig for the canned soup the twins wanted for dinner.

He found the tomato soup pushed to the back of the pantry next to the fridge and also pulled out a can of diced tomatoes and a can of evaporated milk. If he was going to have to feed them canned soup he was going to make it taste better damn it. He found a soup pan and set it on the burner then scrounged around for a can opener and opened the cans then dumped them all into the pan then added a little bit of water and went to the fridge for the butter. He cut off a tablespoon and dropped it in the soup and then sat the butter on the counter for their grilled cheeses and put the fire on low. He grabbed the loaf of crusty bread with grainy bits on it and sliced it for their grilled cheeses.

He’d make him one too he decided. He didn’t usually eat with them, but today he would. If only for the fact that he hadn’t actually had a grilled cheese since he was a kid. He’d forgotten how good they were. How simple they were to make on days when the closest thing he did that came to cooking was tapping the number for a pizza place out on his phone and only rolling off of the couch to answer the door when the delivery driver showed up. Those days sucked. When he got so wrapped up in his own head,  _ in his own shit _ , that he didn’t realize how long he lay there until his stomach started growling. Those days were few and far between, but even so he still hated them. Hated the stifling thoughts that weighed on him. The tightness that felt like an elephant sitting on his chest. The apathetic way he couldn’t bring himself to care about anything when minutes later he’d be having an anxiety attack over caring too much about the same thing he’d not given a shit about only moments before. He shook his head to clear it then turned the heat up under the soup so he could get done with dinner as soon as possible.

Bucky stuck his head out of the kitchen ten minutes later and smiled seeing the twins sitting on the couch and flicking cards with deadly accuracy into a large urn that sat under one window. He wondered if Steve or Natasha had been the one to teach them. Probably Steve. He had never seen Natasha playing with a deck of cards for as long as he’d known her.

“Dinner’s ready, heathens.” They scrambled off of the couch toward the urn to pick up their cards and he waved them away. “I’ll get it. Go wash up.”

“Okay, Mr. Barnes.”

He watched them scramble up the stairs then ducked back into the kitchen and filled three bowls with soup then sat them on plates and sat their grilled cheeses that he’d cut diagonally in half beside the bowls. He put two on the table for the twins then dug around for the tea tray he’d seen the other day but couldn’t remember where. He’d take Steve his dinner. He still had to talk to Steve about the twins opening the door to him.

What kind of moron let kids open the door anyway? Yeah, they weren’t technically in the city, but they weren’t in the country either. People didn’t keep their cars or doors unlocked. Didn’t have friendly neighbors who brought them pies and shit when they moved in or were ill or whatever. It was dangerous. Steve had to know that. He couldn’t be that naïve. Could he? Probably, Bucky decided as he carried the tray out of the kitchen, sidestepping the kids on the stairs as they ran down. Steve hadn’t asked him a single question when he’d show up the first day. Hadn’t done anything really except take Natasha’s word apparently. What a moron. That wasn’t to say he couldn’t trust Natasha. You could. Most of the time. Definitely with your life if nothing else and that was only if she liked you or was on a mission with you. Still, Steve was too trusting to just let the twins open the door without him.

Bucky stepped into Steve’s office, waiting the door for a moment to see if he’d be noticed. Steve was leaning over his desk, stupid (adorable) glasses on his face and staring at the screen of his laptop. He snorted shaking his head and Bucky almost smiled, would have if it wasn’t still irritated over Steve’s naivety with letting the twins answer the door. He watched the blonde type a response then walked into the room. Bucky sat the tray on Steve’s desk with a snap of metal against hardwood and Steve jumped, almost flinging himself backward over his chair.

“What!”

“Why didn’t you answer the door?”

“The twins did.”

“I know the twins did! It could have been anyone, Rogers.”

“You’re the only one that gets here at four.”

“Doesn’t matter. I don’t want those babies opening that door themselves ever again!”

“Okay. Okay. I just thought…I didn’t think you’d want to see me after yesterday and you seem calmer when it’s just you and the twins so I thought it would be okay for them to answer the door after they made sure it was you.”

“Those kids are my responsibility, Steve. I take that very seriously.”

“I’m their father. Do you think I don’t? You think they’re not my responsibility?” Steve didn’t know whether to be offended that Bucky didn’t seem to think he could take care of his own kids or impressed that Bucky cared about them enough to be pissed off and accusatory. He’d known it was Bucky at the door. Had watched him walk up the sidewalk to the porch from one of the windows upstairs. He had okayed it for the twins to let him in.

“Not after I show up they’re not. I’m their caretaker until I leave for the night and I don’t ever want to see them opening the door at another knock as long as I’m working here. I don’t care who’s at the door. Eat your fucking soup and your damned grilled cheese. Fucking canned shit. It’s a goddamn travesty.” Bucky spun on his heels and stomped out of the room leaving Steve staring in his wake.

“Holy shit.”

So maybe he needed to apologize to Bucky for letting the kids answer the door? Or maybe he needed to apologize for having canned soup in the cabinets instead of whatever it was Bucky needed to make homemade tomato soup. Should he make his own damn cheese too? Bake his own bread? What the hell was wrong with soup out of a can? Why should he have to apologize for that? It was food. The kids loved it. Yeah, it probably wasn’t all that healthy but even so they hardly ever ate it to begin with. What was so bad about tomato soup out of a can anyway?

Steve sighed, pushing his laptop away from him and pulled the tray closer. Taking a tentative spoonful of the soup he decided that there was definitely something bad about canned tomato soup. He didn’t know what exactly Bucky had done to it aside from the chunks of tomato he’d added but holy shit this was so much better than usual. He’d marry Bucky just for his cooking skills alone if he could. The man was a god in the kitchen.

That thought made him blink, his spoon dropping back into the bowl. There wasn’t even a relationship to go with that thought. Wasn’t even a vague sense of friendship. What the fuck brain? Yeah, Bucky was gorgeous what with the curl of his lips when he smiled, the adorable crinkles at the corners of his eyes, the long messy hair always pulled back in a low bun that left little wisps of hair caressing his cheekbones and jawline. None of that meant anything. It couldn’t mean anything. Bucky was his employee and that was all. That was it. There was nothing else to him. There couldn’t be. Not only did Bucky seem to not like him in any way, shape, or form, but that was a gross breach of employer/employee conduct. Too much like taking advantage and Steve would never do that. No matter how badly he wanted to pin Bucky to the wall and kiss him stupid. And he really, really, wanted. He sighed again and shoved the tray back across his desk and pulled his laptop closer. He’d eat later.

***

“You didn’t eat.” Steve leaned back from his laptop, blinking to get his eyes to adjust, and saw Bucky standing just in the doorway. “Was it bad? It’s from a can.” His voice sounded so small and unsure that Steve wanted to wrap him in a hug and never let him go.

“No. It’s uh…it’s really great, actually. I just…” Steve waved a hand toward his laptop and the brunette nodded with a small smile. “Work.”

“Yeah…it’s…I’ll take it down for you. It’s gross cold. Especially the grilled cheese.”

“I’ll take it, Bucky. I’m almost done with this.”

“I’ll reheat it for you.”

“I can do it.”

“I know.” Bucky came in and took the tray then left without another word.

Steve let out a heavy sigh then shut his laptop. He could finish after the twins went to bed for the night. Bucky wasn’t supposed to be taking care of him too. He pushed himself back from his desk and grabbed his sketchbook and pencil then went downstairs to stop the brunette. When he got to the kitchen Bucky already had the soup reheating on the stove and another grilled cheese in the frying pan.

“Bucky, you don’t have to do this. You’re just here for the kids.”

“Let me do something nice, Rogers.” Though he didn’t really know why he was trying to be nice to Steve unless it was an unspoken apology for chewing his ass earlier.

As pissed off as Bucky was earlier Steve really didn’t want to irritate him even further so nodded and sat at the table that had already been cleared of the twins’ dinner dishes. He watched the brunette move around the stove, stirring the soup and flipping the grilled cheese. The one that had gone cold sat with a bite taken out of it on a plate. He smiled at that then began a quick sketch of Bucky as he finished heating up Steve’s dinner. Another apology sketch. He finished just as Bucky was sitting his dinner on the table then quickly added a hyacinth. It was supposed to be purple for an apology, but he only had his pencil. Bucky probably didn’t know what it was supposed to mean anyway. Just like the other sketch he’d given him.

He tore it from the sketchpad and sat it on the table, sliding it toward the brunette after he’d sat Steve’s soup and grilled cheese in front of him.

“What’s this,” Bucky asked. Steve didn’t answer, only pushed the piece of paper closer to him, and Bucky picked it up barely resisting the urge to roll his eyes. What he saw made his heart stutter in his chest and he blinked at the paper he held in front of him.

It couldn’t have taken Steve more than five minutes to finish the sketch. That was about how long it had been since the blonde sat at the table. Still it was…stunning, Bucky thought. Somehow Steve had made him look almost ethereal even while doing something as mundane and domestic as fixing his dinner. Somehow in those few minutes the blonde had managed to capture Bucky in a light he’d never seen himself before. He seemed content. Casual but still graceful on the page. Steve had caught the messy bun of his hair, the lock of hair curling along his jawline. One hand stirring the soup while he flipped the grilled cheese with the other. The look on the half of his face that you could see suggested a smile from the upturned corner of his lips and the little crinkles around his eye.

It made Bucky nervous that Steve could see so much in so little time. How much else could Steve see just by watching him? What if he realized that Bucky was crushed on him? What if he realized that it might even be more than that? Because if the sketch told Bucky anything at all it was that Steve watched him, and carefully, even when the twins weren’t around him. Why? What was his reason for watching Bucky so closely? He’d been nothing but an ass to Steve the entire time, mostly because he didn’t want to get close to the blonde, so why did Steve seem to watch him so much?

“It’s an apology. Another one.” Steve ate a spoonful of his soup, looking away from the brunette for the first time since walking into the kitchen.

“For what?”

“You chewed my ass for it an hour ago.”

“I…” I what? Bucky didn’t know what to say. What to do. He was completely lost and it was over a sketch. What the hell, brain? He needed to go. Needed to leave before he did something stupid like kiss the blonde that sat across the table from where he stood. “I have to go.” He turned to leave and Steve reached out and grabbed his arm.

“Bucky. I’m sorry if I did something wrong. I just…don’t leave.” God he looked so pitiful.

“I…it’s fine, Steve. Really. I just…have to go.” Bucky pulled his arm from Steve’s grasp then grabbed the other sketch from the table and fled the house before Steve could do anything else that would break past the wall of snark and assholery that Bucky surrounded himself with to keep himself from getting close to the blonde.

Steve winced as the door swung shut behind Bucky then groaned and pushed his plate aside, thunking his head on the table. What had he done this time? It was just a sketch, but why had Bucky reacted like that? First it seemed he was in awe but then there was the panic again. Why was he panicking over a quick apology sketch? Could he see how much Steve liked watching him? How closely he’d been watching him while reheating his dinner? Had he freaked him out that badly with it? It was just a sketch. Just a slice of life. It wasn’t even the best he could do.

What if Bucky quit over it? Oh, fuck. He’d have to find a new nanny. How the fuck would he manage to find one as competent as Bucky? He’d have to ask Natasha if she knew anyone else that was good with kids. Even if she had already told him that Bucky was the best person she knew to do it. Oh, shit. Natasha. How the hell would he explain it to Natasha? Bucky was one of her few friends. One of her best if she trusted him enough to watch the twins. Even if Steve had never heard of him until now, which really wasn’t all that surprising considering it was Natasha. She was going to kill him if he had made Bucky quit.

He pulled his cell phone out of his pocket to get the conversation/his death over with. She answered after the second ring and he whimpered hearing her voice. “Natasha. I fucked up.”

***

Bucky let himself into Natasha’s house, he didn’t dare call it their house even if he lived there and had for most of a year, and tossed his keys on the little table by the door. A fist flew out at him from nowhere and he caught it and glared at the petite redhead it belonged to.

“Not in the mood, Tasha.”

“What happened? Steve called in hysterics thinking he’d royally fucked up.”

“Jesus. Nothing happened. It’s fine.” How much of a drama queen was Steve? He hadn’t fucked up. Bucky had. Well, he didn’t think Steve had fucked up. It was just a couple sketches, but still.

“Steve is awkward and a little bit pathetic sometimes, but he doesn’t usually call in hysterics. Not unless one of the twins is sick.”

“Goodnight.” He went to brush past her and she grabbed his arm.

“James.” Natasha gave him one of her knowing looks and he sighed. “Is it that bad?”

“I don’t know, Natasha.” He really didn’t. Had he fucked up? Had Steve even really fucked up? He was nervous about Steve realizing how much he liked him. He hoped the blonde never found out and that meant not being nice to him anymore. Not that he was very nice to him to begin with. There had to be a balance between being an asshole and being nice. Something in the middle that left him aloof but not too much of an asshole.

“It’s only been a few days, James. What happened?” Something had definitely happened aside from Steve giving Bucky the sketches. Were they falling for each other already? She knew she was good, but damn. She hadn’t exactly told either one of them that the other was definitely their type, but still. They were big boys. Surely they could see how great they would be together? Maybe only a few days was moving a little fast, but even so they were good for each other. But what exactly had happened? She’d find out one way or another.

“What did he say?” There was no telling what Steve had told her. Especially if he was being as dramatic as Natasha seemed to think.

“Only that he gave you a couple sketches, you seemed really uncomfortable and then you left.”

“That’s it?”

“That’s it.” He narrowed his eyes at her, knowing it wouldn’t intimidate her in the least and she only blinked at him.

“How is that hysterics?”

“His tone of voice.” Bucky rolled his eyes and she smiled. “So, what’s up with the sketches he gave you?”

“They’re just sketches.”

“And why did that make you panic and leave?” He rolled his eyes again then pulled the folded up sketches out of his pocket and handed them to her then finally made his way past her into the house. He immediately went into the kitchen and grabbed a beer leaving her to look them over.

Natasha carefully unfolded the heavy paper and smiled when she saw a sketch of the twins and James lying out in the backyard by their garden. All three of them were smiling beautifully, James was pointing up at a cloud shaped like a duck. She could tell they’d been laughing and playing. What was surprising was the flower in the corner of the sketch. A Hybrid Delphinium. Oh, Steve. It meant fun and lightness sure. But it also meant ardent attachment. Had he meant that part of it?

The next sketch was of Bucky cooking at the stove and she sighed. She could see the attention that Steve had paid him drawn on the paper in sweeping lines. The laugh lines round his eye, the little curl of his lip. His hair brushing his jawline. No wonder Bucky had panicked. Steve’s feelings for him were right on the page. But was that what Bucky had seen? 

Had Bucky seen any of that or had he only seen how closely Steve watched him and just assumed Steve was being paranoid and keeping an eye on him? She sighed shaking her head then looked at the flower in the corner. This one was a Hyacinth. Depending on its color it could mean anything. Blue meant sincerity. Purple meant please forgive me, sorrow, and I’m sorry. Yellow meant jealousy. Red meant play time or recreation and white meant loveliness. So which color had Steve meant it to be?

From the way he’d acted it was probably supposed to be purple. Steve had rambled through his explanation while telling her he had fucked up. Apparently he thought Bucky had been having panic issues and had given him the first sketch as an apology for overstepping his bounds when he’d asked about it because he thought the brunette would like it. The second sketch was for something she hadn’t quite gotten out of the blonde, but as panicked as he was about it she knew he was apologizing again. Even if he possibly hadn’t said it out loud. 

She highly doubted Bucky knew what the flowers meant. He would probably be more panicked than what Steve had thought he’d been. She thought for a second that she might tell him, but decided it would be more fun to let him find out on his own. If he ever figured out that there was a different flower on them. She had a feeling that these two drawings were the first of many. She couldn’t wait to see how long it took him to realize it.

“These are beautiful sketches,” she murmured walking into the kitchen to find him sipping from a beer as he sat at the small table.

“Yeah. They’re good.” She sat the sketches on the table in front of him and he sighed heavily.  “They’re really good. I don’t know why I panicked over them.”

“Don’t you?” She gave him a knowing smile, as if there was anything to know, and he rolled his eyes.

“He watches me. I don’t know why. It makes me nervous. Paranoid. Is he just checking on the twins to make sure they’re okay with me or is it something else?” He didn’t know what that something else could be, but if Steve watched him that closely then there had to be a reason for it.

“Steve’s…very observant. He always has been. That’s what made him a Captain in the Army and one of the best S.H.I.E.L.D. agents. It’s nothing to worry about.”

“If you say so.”

“I’m always right.”

He snorted shaking his head then yelped when she slugged him on the shoulder with a glare.

“Agree with me damn it.”

“Fine! It’s nothing to worry about.” Totally fine. Absolutely nothing to worry about. Definitely no worries here. There would be no further worries.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, seriously, the canned tomato soup sounds weird like that, but it's really good and super easy to doctor.
> 
> 2 regular sized cans of tomato soup  
> 1 can evaporated milk (not sweetened condensed)  
> 1-2 tbs butter  
> 1 can of diced tomatoes  
> 2 cans of water


	5. Somebody's Watching You Baby

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Y'all get an update two days early! 
> 
> Also I am marking this as 12 chapters in length. Possibly give or take a couple. But it should end somewhere around that number.
> 
> Chapter title taken from Lonely is The Night by Billy Squire.

There were worries. There were lots of worries. Bucky spent his three day weekend ignoring texts from Steve asking if he’d be returning to work on Monday, listening to Natasha bitch at him for moping, and well, moping. He drove himself crazy wondering what the hell he was supposed to do. It was just sketches and Steve was obviously a dork who didn’t know how to speak to humans properly and how the hell did he manage to teach an art history class if he couldn’t speak to anyone without blushing or being awkward? Just like Bucky couldn’t function around Steve because he was stupidly, unfairly gorgeous. So fucking gorgeous.

By the time Monday rolled around he’d decided to keep his job. He needed the money. He’d just avoid Steve as much as possible. If he didn’t go back Natasha would dig up some God awful mission for him to go on as punishment for fucking up instead. He’d take awkwardly working for Steve over terrible missions any day. 

So he’d texted Steve and apologized for not answering him before, telling him that he’d been busy and hadn’t been able to check his messages, but he’d still be at work that afternoon. Steve texted back almost immediately, like he’d been waiting to hear from Bucky, and told him that it was fine and he’d see him that afternoon.

It had been a suspiciously easy conversation and it only served to make Bucky more paranoid. What the fuck, Steve?

How was the blonde so calm? Or at least seemingly calm, because he hadn’t sent a message in all caps and hadn’t called to yell at him for ignoring his texts about work all weekend. Bucky would have been pissed off if his employee hadn’t responded for three days. He’d have fired them and made sure they knew not to use him as a reference when applying for a new job. Hell he’d probably be a vindictive ass and use his connections to make sure they couldn’t find another job. Okay, maybe he wouldn’t go  _ that _ far but he’d for sure fire them. So why the hell was Steve being nice enough to not fire him? Was it because of Natasha, because she had been the one to recommend Bucky to watch the kids? What other reason could it be?

Sometimes it sucked getting a job that a friend had recommended you for. If it didn’t turn out for whatever reason it looked bad on the one who had recommended you. If you hated it and quit, it looked bad on both of you. If you hated them and quit it just made you look like an asshole. If you were nervous because the guy was exceptionally hot it made you look slightly crazy and if they were nice like Steve he worried that you were having panic attacks and wanted to let you know that if there was something he could do to help to let him know and he’d do it. He’d also taken it upon himself to try to remedy the situation by removing himself from it completely.

Which, yeah okay it was super nice, but still that meant the twins were the ones to open the door and call Bucky paranoid, ha! But he’d rather they didn’t do that, ever. Not just to him, but to anyone that knocked on the door.

He knew there were bad people in this world. He helped protect it from them. He and Natasha and Steve all had, but somehow Steve had managed to hang on to enough innocence to let the kids open the door on their own. It made Bucky crazy. He wasn’t exactly cynical, but he knew how cruel the world could be and wanted to protect people as much as he possibly could. Especially kids, he wanted them to retain their innocence for as long as possible. He maybe even wanted to protect Steve’s kids especially because Steve and Natasha had entrusted their lives with him. And maybe it wasn’t quite as dramatic as all that, but even so he’d protect them with everything he had. Even if it meant protecting them from their own kind hearted father because what kind of moron lets his babies open the door when someone knocks on it?

“Now you’re being dramatic again.” Bucky groaned dropping his head back against his pillow. “Talking to yourself is definitely not a sign of stability, Barnes.”  _ Besides, everyone talks to themselves so that would make everyone unstable which technically means they’d all be stable anyways. Fuck you psychology. _ “‘Course I’d for sure be stable if Steve wasn’t so fucking gorgeous. It’s so not fair.”

It really wasn’t.

By the time two o’clock had rolled around Bucky had managed to actually talk himself into getting out of bed and taking a shower. He’d also managed to keep any and all fantasies starring the incredibly hot blonde to the bare minimum of wanking material. His life was turning into a bad porno. He could feel it. He could almost hear the sound of terrible porn music. Only for some reason his bad porno life had midi files instead of mp3. Probably it would have a midi file of some  _ Ed Sheeran _ song. Or  _ Careless Whisper _ , the cover by  _ Seether _ though. Maybe  _ Clint Eastwood _ by Gorillaz or  _ Heathens _ by  _ Twenty-One Pilots _ instead. They both had a distinctly porn-y feel to them when done as midi files. And why were there still midi files anyway?

He made his way to Steve’s house. The hour long walk giving him too much time to think about his bad porno life and which midi file he’d use for which scene. By the time he’d made it to the door he had his entire porno midi file musical line up done in his head and a disturbing amount of planning and organization. He had figured out where they’d start and what song would be playing. Where they’d move to and which song it would shift to. Whom would be doing what to whom when whatever particular midi file was playing.

He definitely was too interested in his imaginary bad porno. So much so that when he knocked on the door and Steve answered it he'd smiled like a dope and almost kissed him hello. Thankfully his nerves had caught up with him and he had managed to catch himself. Smiling like a dope was bad enough. He'd have to quit for real if he kissed Steve.

Instead he'd smiled and pretended nothing was wrong while he died on the inside a little bit more.

***

Steve blinked at the brunette that was standing the doorway with a dopey smile on his face and his hair out of a bun for once. While it was better than the usual panic, Steve was still concerned. Had he taken something before coming over? Drank something? He swayed toward Steve for a second then stopped himself with a shocked look and a shake of his head. Was he drunk? Steve leaned in trying to smell for alcohol on his breath and Bucky gasped backing away slightly. Okay, not drunk, but what the hell? Bucky wasn’t usually this…non-combative or non-panicky.

“You okay, Buck?”

“Hmm? Oh, yeah, I’m fine Stevie. The kids in the kitchen?”

Stevie? No one had called him Stevie since his mother when he was eight years old and decided he was too old for that baby name. “Yeah. Are you sure you’re okay?”

“Perfectly fine. Hey um…thanks for not firing me? I mean…I would have if someone had done what I did this weekend. So, thanks.” Bucky shrugged, shoving his hands in his jeans pockets and Steve only blinked at him again.

“Why would I ever fire you? You said you were busy and couldn’t answer. It’s fine. Besides you’re really great with the kids. They adore you so much.”

“Good. That’s…good. So um…I’m gonna go in there.” He nodded toward the kitchen then slipped past the blonde into the house, accidently sliding his ass across Steve’s hip. That was 100% an accident. Not even a tiny bit on purpose.

Steve turned to watch the brunette go into the kitchen and smiled when he heard the twins’ excited chatter. At least Bucky seemed to be in a better mood this time around. He wasn’t panicking or snapping or yelling at him. Whatever Bucky had done this weekend or taken before he’d gotten to work seemed like it had helped him a great deal. Maybe he’d gotten some medication for his anxiety? Either way he was glad Bucky seemed to be doing better.

He smiled again when Alexa giggled and then turned to go upstairs to his office, barely remembering to shut the front door from where he’d stood with it hanging open like a moron because he’d been so shocked at Bucky’s lack of panic. He paused on the stairs, deciding that maybe he should keep an eye on Bucky and twins for a moment before going back to his office. Just in case whatever medication Bucky might have taken made him a little loopy or something.

_ Sure, that’s the only reason you want to keep an eye on him. It has nothing to do with him being the most gorgeous man you’ve ever seen in your life. It has nothing to do with the fact that you think he looks amazing with the twins. Nothing to do with the fact that even though he’s a complete dick to you he’s an angel to the twins.  _ Shut up, brain!

He shook his head to clear it then went back down the stairs as silently as possible, dodging the creaky steps, and peeked around the doorway into the kitchen. Bucky was on one side of the table and the twins were on the other as usual. Bucky was on his knees in the chair, leaning over the table and reading out loud from one of the twins’ books. He kept reaching up to tuck his hair back behind his ear and Steve’s eyes followed the graceful movement. Lips forming a wistful smile as locks of Bucky’s bangs that were too short to stay slid back along his cheekbone framing it perfectly. Another lock, longer than the others, fell forward kissing the corner of his perfect mouth and Steve nearly sighed like a lovestruck fool. 

He eventually dragged himself away; if only to get his sketchbook and put the image on paper instead of working. It was becoming a problem, he thought. Or very nearly one. How he wanted to stay downstairs and watch Bucky with his children. He couldn’t. Couldn’t allow himself to keep doing it. Keep watching them. He couldn’t keep lying to himself about why. Yes, he did enjoy seeing his children happy. What parent wouldn’t? And he did actually check to make sure they were okay, but he enjoyed the smiles on Bucky’s face just as much as he did his twins’ and it  _ wasn’t allowed _ .

There was a big flashing no symbol above the brunette’s head that warned Steve away. One that he kind of wanted to take a baseball bat to, but still it was there for a good reason. Reasons actually; the first of them was the fact that Bucky was his employee. Secondly, Bucky was a fucking tool, a gorgeous one at that, but a tool nonetheless. And pine as he might over someone he could never be with, he wouldn’t want to anyway if the guy was a douche canoe. Like Bucky. Total douche canoe. Damn him for being so pretty and so good with the twins. Not that Steve was pining.  _ He wasn’t. Would never. _ Pining was for teenagers and he’d outgrown that a long time ago.

Steve scowled at the sketch appearing on the pad that rested on his knee, Bucky’s likeness captured perfectly. He wanted so badly to take his frustration out on the page and scribble all of Bucky’s features away, but couldn’t bring himself to. Not when the twins were also on that page. Both of them writing on their papers as Bucky read to them, twin looks of fierce concentration on their faces that so reminded him of himself. The little line between their eyebrows, the slight pout of their lips. He was still floored every day that his spawn were so much like him. So much like Natasha too.

Hell, he was still floored every day that he even had his tiny ginger demon babies. He loved them more and more every day and had since they were born and Natasha had placed them in his arms. He’d been young and stupid and hadn’t the faintest idea what to do with them. Had no clue how to take care of them, but he’d wanted them so badly. Wanted a family so badly. He’d easily given up the life he’d known for them. He never regretted it. Not once in the last almost ten years had he regretted his babies. Not when they woke every couple hours needing changed and fed. Not when he thought he might have bitten off more than he could chew the first time they’d both gotten sick. Not when he realized he was hilariously ill-equipped for twins at first. He had decided early on that raising twins on his own was harder than any mission he’d ever been sent on. Harder than basic training. Harder than the hand to hand and martial arts that Natasha had taught him.

He worried about them constantly. Wondered if he’d chosen the right school, the right clothes, and the right suburb for them to grow up in. The right way of teaching them all that he knew. Telling them of the mistakes he had made along the way in hopes that they wouldn’t repeat them. They were only nine, he had a few more years until they were gone from under his roof, but he prayed every day that he was doing the best for them that he could. He’d never been afraid of failure before. Not really. He had always been confident and sure that he wouldn’t fail. But this? Raising two children who depended on him for everything? He’d never been so terrified in his life that he would fail them in some way. The only thing he could do was try not to and if he did fail them in some way, try to make up for it the best he could.

He knew it was impossible to be a perfect parent, but oh how he wanted to be. Tried to be. Sometimes it wore him out. Made him tired and like he just wanted to sleep the hours away. But it was worth it to see the smiles on the twins’ faces. Worth the time and effort and pain and tears. It was always worth it and would always be worth it, if only to see them smile so brightly.

Steve sighed heavily, sketching a Zinnia in the bottom corner for lasting affection, and pretended that the flower only applied to his children as he sat his sketchbook aside and moved to his desk. He needed to get to work. Needed to finish up before dinner for once instead of waiting until after and then taking a break to get his heathens in bed and not finishing until late. He honestly didn’t have much to do this time, it just seemed like it dragged on and on. Especially when he was reading through his student’s assignments. He had six sitting in his inbox he needed to scan over and reply to the questions at the end of. He just really didn’t want to deal with it. It was one of his struggles about his parenting skills. He only wanted to be with his children, to make sure they were safe and cared for, but had to work. He’d felt so guilty even asking Natasha if she knew someone that could help him.

She had tried to tell him he didn’t need to feel guilty. That sometimes people needed help and it was okay to ask for it, something he had always hated doing, and then told him that Bucky would be a good choice. And that was that. Bucky started work two days later and Steve’s life had changed so drastically. Now he only wanted to spend time with the brunette and the twins. Wanted to see Bucky’s smiles directed at him instead of his usual scowls. Wanted to feel Bucky’s lips on his. Wanted his hands all over him. Wanted to feel the strength of the muscle Bucky kept hidden under grungy clothes. He groaned and dropped his head onto his desk with a thunk.

“You can’t do this. You cannot do this, Rogers. He’s the nanny. You can’t want to fuck your nanny. So many bad pornos start off with that and you cannot let your life turn into a bad porno.”  _ His dick is probably huge _ , a little voice supplied, making him whimper. “Shut up, tiny voice.”  _ But you want to see it. _ “Ugh.” He slammed his forehead against his desk then sat up and opened his laptop. “Work. I’m working. I don’t have time for you, tiny voice.” He clicked on the first email he saw and opened the attached file hoping it would distract him enough to shut the tiny voice up. And to keep him from sighing wistfully like a moron. And to prevent him getting distracted by his twins and Bucky laughing hysterically or screaming and running and playing in the backyard. “Get to work, Rogers. You can do this.”

Less than fifteen minutes later he’d caught himself listening to the twins and Bucky play arguing over what they wanted for dinner with a dopey smile on his face. He wanted to flail around like Kermit the Frog in that gif that was everywhere for a while. Only Steve would be flailing in frustration instead of excitement. 

He pushed himself away from his desk and went to his office door, closing it for the first time since he’d bought the house and turned the room into his office, and then made his way back to his desk and fell into his chair opening Windows Media Player and finding the last playlist he’d had open. He felt so old still using it, but it worked. He plugged the cable for his sound system in and turned the music up, actually flailing and almost falling from his chair when  _ Closer _ by  _ Nine Inch Nails _ started to play.

“Oh, hell no!” He scrambled to hit a button, any button, on his keyboard that would silence the song.  _ There will be no fucking like animals, damn it!  _ But oh, how he wanted to. He shook his head, irritated with himself and skipped it to the next song then pushed play.  _ More Human Than Human _ started, the uncensored one at that, and he whimpered and skipped it again.  _ What the hell playlist? Remind me of what I can’t do, thanks. Loads of help. _ He skipped it again and  _ Freak on a Leash _ started. He figured it was safe enough and turned the volume up a little bit more until he felt like his entire body was rattling then sighed and got to work.

***

Bucky looked up at the ceiling when he heard music blaring and raised a brow when the song cut off a few seconds later.  _ Nine Inch Nails _ ?  _ Closer _ even. Maybe there was a midi file of that for his bad porno life. And that one, he added when  _ More Human Than Human _ started. Was Steve planning his own bad porno? Or maybe a really hot aggressive one? That’d be nice. Certainly nicer than Bucky’s own bad midi file filled one. 

Maybe he was planning his new stripper routine? Art Stripper Steve dancing to  _ Closer _ while taking off his clothes one piece at a time. The dorky cardigan would go first, and then he’d unbutton and unzip his jeans, pull off his t-shirt with paint splattered hands, run his hands over his pecs, teasing at his nipples and then down his abs leaving messy streaks of acrylic paint in their wake. Leaving even more streaks as he pushed his jeans down revealing that he hadn’t been wearing anything under the almost threadbare denim jeans. Jesus. Bucky could almost see it. Could almost feel the pounding bass. His heart thumping along in time as Steve moved to the music wearing nothing but those stupidly sexy glasses. The little multicolored flakes of dried acrylic paint beginning to peel as Steve ran a hand around his pelvis and inner thighs, never touching the one place Bucky wanted him to touch more than anything.

“Mr. Barnes? I need help with number six.”

Bucky jolted, falling over and taking his chair with him in a clatter of wood and metal on tile. He groaned when he landed on his left arm. “Ow.”

“Oh, my God! Mr. Barnes, are you okay!” Alexa ran around the table, hands fluttering wildly as she looked him over. He nodded with another groan and rolled over onto his back.

“I’m fine.”  _ God that was so fucking inappropriate, Buck. You’re at fucking work, dumb shit. _

“Should I go get Daddy?”

“No!” She flinched and he sighed. “No, sweetheart. I’m fine. I promise. I’m sorry.”  _ So fucking embarrassing. _

“Are you sure?”

“Yep.” He sat up with a wince, rubbing at his collarbone absently. It was going to ache like a bitch later. Why did he have to fling himself to the floor?  _ Because you’re lusting after your boss, moron. Jesus. You’re supposed to be taking care of the kids. You don’t have time for this shit. _

He dragged himself out of the floor and sat his chair upright after making sure he hadn’t broken it. “Which one did you need help with?” He sat in the chair as Alexa walked back around the table and then pushed her paper toward him.

“Number six.” He read over the math problem wondering once again why the hell there were so many names and shit in it now. Who cared how many hamburgers Bobby bought and was stingy with? They might as well have asked what the airspeed velocity of an unladen swallow was. Both questions were pointless, though the latter was more amusing than Bobby and his stupid hamburgers that he refused to share with Geoffrey. Bucky wondered if the twins had ever seen Monty Python and The Holy Grail. Probably not. They didn’t seem to watch much on the TV and their DVD and Blu-Ray collection was rather low in number. They kept busy with homework and playing games or playing outside more than they watched TV. Which was cool. That’s how he’d always been as a kid. Even if he had wanted a Super Nintendo that his ma couldn’t afford to get him. The first thing he’d done when he got enough money was buy a Wii and Mario Kart. It was the best money he’d ever spent. Eventually no one would play with him though because he refused to lose and blue shelled the hell out of everyone. Still it was fun. Alexa tapped her page to get his attention and he nodded then showed her how to work out the problem on a piece of scrap paper while the music continued to blast from upstairs.

The kids had finished homework and dinner had been eaten. The music from upstairs was still going. Bucky was dancing along to it as he put Steve’s plate in the microwave and began to load the dishwasher. Dancing like crazy because there was no one watching him. He kept his eye on the doorway as he moved; making sure Steve wasn’t standing in it watching him as was his apparently favorite pastime. 

Bucky was sweating by the time he was done cleaning up and the twins ran into the kitchen dancing with him when some pop song he didn’t know came on. They apparently did though, singing at the top of their lungs and dancing around the room. He watched them with a smile then joined in their dancing, letting them drag him in circles around the kitchen table.  _ Lonely is the Night _ started and the kids left the kitchen and ran upstairs to get ready for bed without their father having to tell them for once. Which what? Why the hell hadn’t Steve come down? Was he that in the zone? Bucky peeked out the doorway and saw Steve’s retreating form following them up. Oh, he had come to get them. How had Bucky missed him? 

He carried the bucket of scraps out to the compost bin then walked into the kitchen singing and dancing his way across the room to rinse the bucket and put it back under the sink. “Somebody’s watching you baby, so much you can do. Nobody’s stopping you baby, from making it too. One glimpse’ll show you now baby, what the music can do. One kiss’ll show you now baby, it can happen to you.” He spun around as he sang the last line and nearly jumped out of his skin when he saw Steve standing in the doorway looking pale and bit sweaty. 

“Oh, fuck.” Bucky really hoped he hadn’t been dancing as suggestively as he thought he might have been. His hair was stuck to his face and neck with sweat, breaths rushing in and out, shoulders heaving with the effort. How long had Steve been there? “Um…”

***

Steve only blinked at the brunette struggling for breath in his kitchen. Steve had never seen anyone move like that before. Not even the strippers at a club that Sam had dragged him to years ago when Steve had been on leave. How the hell did Bucky know how to move like that? All swaying hips and body rolls and running his hands through his dark hair. Jesus. Steve needed a cold shower. He wanted nothing more than to drag Bucky over to him and kiss those red bitten lips for all he was worth. Run his hands over him and rest them on his hips. See if Bucky would dance like that just for him.

“Rogers?” Bucky moved toward him slowly and Steve shook his head and blinked some more. “What’s wrong? You look…sweaty.”

“So do you.” Steve’s voice was rough with arousal and he cleared his throat. He had to get away from Bucky before he did something stupid. “You can go. Thank you.” With that he turned and fled.

***

Bucky blinked as he watched Steve tuck tail and run. What the hell just happened? Had Steve had some kind of panic attack? Like he was always asking Bucky? When Steve had first seen him those short few days ago he’d blinked and not said a word for the longest time. After that he hadn’t seemed bothered, but now? What the hell was Bucky supposed to do about it? Yeah, he’d probably been dancing more suggestively than he should have been, but he he’d been alone. Had thought he’d been alone anyway. How long had Steve watched him? Had he watched him from the moment he’d gone back into the kitchen or just long enough to see him singing and dancing? And why the fuck had Steve looked at him like that? Like he wasn’t sure what to make of him? Like he wanted to say something or do something? And then just dismissed him like that? ‘You can go. Thank you.’? What the fuck was that about? Scare the living shit out of him and then run?

He wanted to go ask Steve what the hell, but that meant talking to him and he was still embarrassed at being caught dancing and singing like that in the man’s kitchen. He had enough problems trying to talk to Steve anyway. He had to be gruff so Steve would almost hate him, but not enough to actually fire him. By now he kind of figured that even if he was a complete dick to Steve the kids liked him well enough that Steve would keep him. As their nanny and not as anything else even though Bucky really, really wanted everything he could get from the blonde. It was still so unfair how gorgeous and out of reach he was. Steve was so off limits for him that there might as well have been a flashing no symbol floating over his head. One he wanted to shoot out of the air with his sniper rifle. So fucking unfair.

He shook his head then walked out of the kitchen, pausing at the bottom of the stairs to look up them to see if Steve was still watching for him. Telling himself that it was the only reason to look for the blonde and not because he wanted one last look at him before he went home for the night.  _ Keep telling yourself that, Barnes. _ He shook his head, at himself and at Steve, then turned and left the house to make his way home to his empty bedroom. 

He didn’t even realize he’d started humming Lonely is the Night as he went until he walked into the house and Natasha started to hum with him.

“Where’d you hear that song?”

“Steve’s. He was blasting music from his office.”

“Hmm.” Steve never listened to music while he was working. Not unless he was distracted by something else. Or  _ someone _ else. He and Bucky needed to get their shit together and talk. It was going to be painful for them if they didn’t. Hysterically funny for her because they were so oblivious, but painful nonetheless. 

“What?”

“Oh, nothing.” This was going to be so great. All the pining these two dumbasses were going to do. She wasn’t going to help them though. They had to figure shit out on their own. She’d already done her part. Bucky thought Steve was absolutely gorgeous, which he was, and Steve…well, Steve thought Bucky was a douche bag. Even if he was head over heels for him from what she could tell by the sketches. Which was good, it was all part of the plan, but even so if Bucky didn’t stop being a dick to Steve it wouldn’t matter.

“Steve usually only listens to music when he’s distracted, it helps him focus.”

“Oh. Why would he be distracted?”

“You.”

“I’m sorry? I don’t even fucking talk to him, Tasha. I go there, I do my job, and I leave. Just like I’m supposed to.”

“Maybe you should talk to him.”

“Nope.”

“Why not?”

“You know why.” He pouted at her, flinging himself down on the couch dramatically. “He’s so gorgeous. And so very off limits.”

“Why off limits?”

“You’re fucking with me right?” He raised both brows in question then groaned and dropped his head against the back of the sofa. “You know what happened last time I got involved with my boss.”

“Yeah, you quit a promising career as head of security at Stark’s.”

“He got clingy and it got weird. I couldn’t stay there. I learned from my mistakes, okay? No more sleeping with the boss. Besides, Steve hates me. I made him hate me.”

“If Steve hated you, you wouldn’t be working for him.”

“Yes, I would. He’s too nice to fire someone just because he dislikes them.”

Bucky had it so bad and didn’t even realize it. Not really. “That is surprisingly astute for someone who hasn’t spoken to him more than strictly necessary.”

“Eh.” Bucky shrugged then stood and walked to the kitchen and grabbed a bottle of water from the fridge. It really wasn’t that hard to figure out that Steve was one of those almost annoyingly nice people. Not after he’d offered to keep out of Bucky’s sight in case of panic attacks. So what if they weren’t even actual panic attacks. Not for the reasons people might think. Honestly, who would think that someone would panic when faced by an unfairly attractive Art History professor that possibly moonlighted as a stripper? Those eyelashes that framed those ocean blue eyes shoulda been fucking illegal. And those lips. Bucky had a multitude of fantasies about those perfect pouty lips. The man was stupidly attractive and Bucky was so very screwed.  

“Look, Barnes. Just try to be nice to him? He adores his kids and that’s why he’s distracted and blasting music through the house. He wants to spend every minute with them that he can and this shit cuts down on his time with them. You get to play with them and make them dinner and that’s what he’s distracted by. I guarantee it.”

“Oh.” Were they playing too loudly? Laughing too loudly while doing their homework and telling bad jokes? They must have been because Steve never closed his office door from what Bucky could tell. Except maybe when he’d played his music so loud earlier. It had sounded muffled, but that could have been from filtering downstairs too. Shit. “Well, the twins and I will keep it down so he can work.”

Holy shit, James was so far off base. This was going to be so amazing. Natasha almost laughed, would have if not for the pitiful look in Bucky’s face, and then patted his shoulder consolingly. “That’s nice. I’m sure he’ll appreciate it.”

Bucky nodded looking miserable. “Yeah.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank y'all so much for the kudos, comments, subscriptions, and bookmarks! They truly make my day. <3


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bucky enters a wet t-shirt contest. 
> 
>  
> 
> Okay, not really, but he does get wet.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Shorter chapter this time, but the next will be longer to make up for it.

Steve had watched out of one of the upstairs windows as Bucky left the house minutes after Steve had rudely dismissed him. Like the brunette was a troublesome servant instead of his employee. He’d fucked up. So fucking bad. He didn’t know how long he had watched Bucky walking down the sidewalk before he’d gone to read the twins their bedtime stories. Only that it was probably longer than it should have been. He needed to get those thoughts, those images of Bucky dancing so suggestively, out of his head and watching the man walk down the sidewalk had not done him any favors. Watching the way his shoulders rolled and his hips swayed, his ass and thighs tantalizing even from so far away. How had he never noticed that Bucky didn’t walk, he fucking prowled, looking dangerous and sexy at the same time. Steve imagined that the brunette could handle himself just fine in a fight; he had been Army and was still part-time with S.H.I.E.L.D. after all.

_ Yeah, Rogers. Fighting is really what you want to imagine him doing. Anything you want to see him doing involves being horizontal or pushed up against a wall or door. _ “Shut up, brain,” he murmured as he went back into the kitchen after making sure the twins were still sleeping soundly. He grabbed his plate from the microwave and ate it cold, not really paying attention to what it was other than the fact that it was chicken and tasted better than anything he could have made. No, his mind was still on the sway of Bucky’s hips as the danced only inches from where Steve was currently sitting. His movements perfectly matching the music as he sang along to the old Billy Squire song. Jesus, he was half-hard over it. Again. Still. Whatever.

He finished his dinner, sticking the plate in the dishwasher and turning it on then went upstairs to his bedroom so he could take a shower. A nice cold shower because he was being so inappropriate right now. No boss should ever be that turned on by one of their employees. Even if they were hot as sin. He refused to masturbate to Bucky. Absolutely refused. He wouldn’t, he told himself as he stripped down and climbed into the shower with a shiver when he turned the cold water on full blast. He was most definitely not going to, he thought, as his hand strayed to the knob for the hot water and turned it on too. It was definitely never gonna happen, he told himself, as he palmed his rapidly swelling erection and started to stroke himself quickly while images of Bucky played behind his closed eyelids. Fuck it; it would only happen once, he told himself as he came far sooner than he’d wanted to. Just the once and that was it. He’d never do it again.

“So inappropriate, Rogers. Never again.”

Never again happened twice more before he fell asleep in his bed covered in come and sweat and dreaming of ice blue eyes and lips that he wanted pressed all over his body.

When he woke in the morning, body crusted with dried sweat and evidence of his lack of propriety and control, because  _ seriously brain? _ He felt guilty. More guilty than he’d ever felt before. It wasn’t his usual Catholic guilt. It went deeper than that. He felt like he’d taken advantage of Bucky even if he hadn’t physically done anything with him. To him. Mental images of sex with the brunette,  _ his employee _ , were just as bad.

And how the hell was he ever supposed to face him again? He’d be seeing him in just under ten hours. He’d avoid him completely if he wouldn’t get his ass chewed for letting the twins open the door to him again. Somehow mortification seemed the lesser of those two evils. And wasn’t that something to worry about later? For now he’d take another shower, where he would absolutely not think about what he’d done the night before, and then get himself and the twins ready for school.

***

School was not so great, Steve thought, as he tossed back the last drink of coffee in his mug. He’d been distracted all day, watching the clock ticking and bringing him closer and closer to having to see Bucky again. Trying to figure out what he’d say or do. Trying to figure out if he should even say or do anything, afraid that if he spoke to Bucky he’d blurt out the fact that he’d had a masturbation marathon over him last night. And wouldn’t that just be great. He’d really have to look for a new nanny after that kind of fuck up.

But the worrying was only half of the problem. He’d spent his entire first hour letting his students talk and fuck off the class because he’d been doodling in the side margin of his papers. Tiny drawings and doodles of Bucky which had turned into a full page front and back, which had led to him pulling out his sketchpad and drawing Bucky as he had been in the kitchen.

In it Bucky had his blue-grey eyes closed, one hand at his neck, the other tangled his hair, lips parted in song. Beads of sweat rested on his skin, one sliding under the collar of his shirt that had ridden up to show the muscles of his lower stomach and the V that Steve wanted to drag his lips and tongue across and down as the low waist of his jeans hung from his hips. The band of his navy boxer briefs showing too, a dark slash against tan skin. At least Steve thought they were boxer briefs. The band looked similar to one of his own pair. 

It was beautiful but didn’t do Bucky any justice at all. Steve wished he had video. He’d never seen someone move so perfectly, look so perfect, as they got lost in the music. He had it so bad and it could never happen. He drew a Coriander flower in the corner for lust, not even pretending that the flower didn’t mean anything for once, and then shoved the sketchpad in the very bottom drawer of his desk under a pile of papers to be forgotten about.

He’d wound up digging it out on his lunch break and shoving it in his satchel to take home with him. He’d brought it back out almost immediately and decided to draw a caricature of himself looking supremely guilty with overly large eyes and a hangdog expression with a Salt Cedar flower drawn in the corner for guilt. As soon as he was finished he shoved the pad back into his satchel which he then kicked under his desk to keep himself from dragging the sketchpad back out.

Now he was sat as his desk watching his students file out the door after the last class of the day. He needed to be getting his shit together to go home and wait for the twins to get off of the bus, but he was still too busy worrying about what to do where Bucky was concerned. Probably the best course of action would be to just let him in, smile politely, and then hide in his office until time for Bucky to go home. Then all he’d have to do is get the twins ready for bed and then pretend that none of the past twenty-four hours had happened. Pretend he’d never seen Bucky singing and dancing in the kitchen, pretend he’d never done what he’d done in the shower and after in his bed. None of it meant anything. Except that he should be, and was, deeply, deeply ashamed over his lack of control. 

He was so fucked where James Barnes was concerned. He could never allow Natasha to find out. She’d never let him hear the end of it. Would make jokes about him being a stereotypical upper middle class white guy wanting to sleep with the nanny. Never mind the fact that he was only upper middle class because of his savings from before he’d become a professor. He’d grown up poor and had been poor until S.H.I.E.L.D had scooped him up after he’d left the Army. And then somehow he’d managed college and missions at the same time and left to become a father and then an Art History professor at a younger age than most. He’d managed to teach his courses and raise his twins and give them the life he’d always wanted. And now? Now his life was plagued by a gorgeous brunette that couldn’t stand the sight of him but was adored by the twins and seemed to adore them in return. He just had to keep him hired on for a few more weeks while doing his best to ignore him and figure out how to sort out the mess his head was in where Bucky was concerned. So, yes, Steve was very fucked.

He sighed heavily then grabbed his satchel and shoved all of the papers off of his desk into it then buckled it shut and left his classroom. He needed to be home to walk the twins home from the bus stop. God forbid Bucky ever find out that they usually walked the half block home from the bus stop alone, but with Steve watching them from the sidewalk in front of their house. Steve would never hear the fucking end of it. He’d get his ass chewed again and not in a fun away. Though he probably wouldn’t mind Bucky biting his ass at some point.  _ Fuck off, brain! _

He got home in time to watch the twins step off of the bus and walk toward him, giggling and calling goodbyes at their friends. He waved at them when they finally stopped shouting at their friends and they waved back with goofy grins on their faces and then ran to him. He dropped his satchel in time for them to jump on him and he spun around with a groan, falling backward onto the grass of their yard and dragging them down with him while they laughed. They did the same thing every day and he dreaded the day they would decide they were too old to climb all over him like a couple of monkeys.

“How was school?”

“Fine. Lexi almost got in trouble with Miss Cooper.” Alexa looked positively gleeful that her twin had almost gotten in trouble with their math teacher. Usually she was more subdued when he got in trouble at school. Steve thought it was because they both usually got in trouble at the same time.

“Really?” Steve raised a brow at his son, but Alexi only shrugged.

“Yeah. He corrected her on one of the math problems that Mr. Barnes helped us with yesterday and she got mad but then she looked it up and Lexi was right!”

“I see.”

“So why did she get mad?”

“Probably because she’s supposed to be the smartest one in the room and teaching you, not the other way around. It’s good that you helped her figure out that she was wrong, but maybe don’t do it in front of the whole class next time, yeah?”

“Okay, Daddy.”

“Good job though, baby.” He waited for his son to snap at him and tell him he wasn’t a baby any longer but the words never came. How much more time did he have before that started up? He couldn’t imagine that he could get away with it for much longer even though they would always be his babies. His adorable ginger demon babies.

“Thank you, Daddy.”

“You’re welcome.” He sat up and gave them both a kiss on the forehead then stood and pulled them up. “Let’s go fix you a snack while we wait for Mr. Barnes.”

By the time they’d gotten their snacks fixed and were sitting at the kitchen table it was five ‘til four and Steve was sitting on the couch waiting for Bucky and pretending he wasn’t freaking out over what to do or say to the brunette. Well, he knew what he wanted to do to the brunette, but that was never going to happen. There was too much at stake for anything to happen.

Steve honestly only hoped that nothing embarrassing came out of his mouth as soon as he opened it. It probably would. Just to torment him. He’d blurt out the fact that he’d had his masturbation marathon over Bucky and then Bucky would quit and Steve would have to tell Natasha that Bucky had quit and even more embarrassing than that, the reason why. And Natasha would never let it go. She’d laugh in his face and then not help him find another nanny for the twins. So, yeah. No speaking to Bucky. He’d just give him a polite smile, wave him into the kitchen with the twins to work on their homework, and then go into his office to work and pretend there wasn’t a devastatingly gorgeous brunette in the kitchen. There wouldn’t be any awkward conversation or accidental confession of impropriety. He’d be fine. He could do this.

He in no way, shape, or form made what could later be described as a mouse-like squeak when said brunette knocked on the door. He stood and wiped his sweaty palms on his khakis as he walked to the door and peeked through the peephole. Not like he was expecting anyone else, but Bucky’s bitch fit from before was still fresh in his mind. He opened the door after confirming that it was the brunette then stepped back to let him in.

Bucky started to step through the door then paused with one foot over the threshold. “Um…I want to apologize for yesterday. I shouldn’t have been…well…”

“It’s okay, Bucky. Really.” See? Not so hard to not blurt out shit he didn’t need to say.

“No, I um…it’s just…”

“Bucky, you were just dancing, it’s fine.” So totally fine. Bucky could dance all he wanted if Steve could see him that lost in the music again.  _ No, damn it! No dancing! No watching him dance! And no more marathons! Get your mind out of the gutter, Rogers. _

“No, that’s not…well, that too maybe, but I’m sorry if me and the kids make too much noise. I guess that’s why you had the stereo up so loud? And we’ll try to be quieter.”

“Wait. What?” Steve blinked wondering when he’d gotten lost and realized it was almost a week ago when Bucky had started working. The minute he’d opened the door to see the brunette standing there was when he’d gotten lost. He was fucked. Bucky couldn’t stand him, he adored Bucky, and he was totally fucked. And not in a fun way.  _ There doesn’t need to be a fun way, brain! _

“The music? I figured the kids and I were distracting you is why you had it on.” Bucky gave him an awkward smile while tucking a lock of hair behind his ear. Steve found it endearing. Even if he didn’t want to. Thank God for Bucky’s obliviousness.

“No, I just needed to work out some frustration and manage to work at the same time. I can’t box every time.”

“Oh. Okay.” 

Steve nodded, more to himself than the brunette, and then stepped further back hoping he’d take the hint and go into the kitchen with the twins before something embarrassing happened. Before Steve blurted out things that ought not to be said. Ever. To anyone. For any reason. But especially not to the star of his recent fantasies.

Bucky gave him a weak smile, a pale example of the happy smiles he showed the twins, then slid past him and walked into the kitchen where the twins were waiting. Steve stifled a sigh of relief since he was no longer in danger of being stupid, then shut the door and made his way upstairs to his office to hide. Work. He was going to be working. He was a grown man and didn’t need to hide. He was too old for this shit. This was like grade school level pining and awkwardness he was doing right now. He was definitely not going to hide from Bucky.

He was totally going to hide.

***

Bucky peeked around the entryway to the kitchen and watched as Steve made his way up the stairs quickly. Like he couldn’t wait to get away from Bucky and his awkwardness and piss poor attitude. It wasn’t Bucky’s fault Steve was unfairly gorgeous and incredibly sexy and caused Bucky to get all awkward and sweaty and flushed. Although he had been being kind of nice for once. He made a mental note to stop the niceness. He couldn’t afford to get attached to Steve. Not with the kids in the mix. Not with his job in the mix. Why the hell did life have to be so fucking unfair? Why couldn’t, just once, shit not be complicated? Why couldn’t he just fall into bed with the blonde and not leave for a few days?

And what was up with Steve today? He’d seemed shifty and awkward. Much like when he’d caught Bucky dancing, but not nearly as bad. Was he upset over it or was there something else? Were his classes stressing him out that badly? No wonder he had needed to hire a nanny. Poor guy. Maybe Art Stripper Steve needed to take a break from stripping too. Not that Bucky figured the blonde actually stripped, but he damn sure didn’t have a Dad Bod. And when the hell did the guy ever have time to hit the gym anyway? Between teaching classes all day and then working at home in the evenings and two kids when did he get the chance? He boxed when annoyed with his students, but surely it wasn’t enough to warrant his build.

And now visions of the time Bucky had watched Steve beating up a punching bag were floating across his vision. The way his shirt had been soaked with sweat and his jeans had ridden low on his hips and the way his ass jiggled so nicely as he punched the bag and bounced lightly on his feet. Damn but Bucky was fucked. So fucked. And not in a fun way. Not that there’d be a fun way. He couldn’t do fun anymore. Not with someone he worked for. He doubted he’d be able to have fun with anyone else right now anyway. Not with how hardcore his crush on Steve was. He was pining so epic it was annoying. He hadn’t pined so much since he’d fallen in love with a little twinky kid back in high school.

And hadn’t that been fun? Bucky had been on the baseball team, not yet out to anyone aside from his mother. He’d been one of the guys, a star on the team, if anyone had ever found out he’d have gotten thrown off the team and probably run out of the school. But Bucky had seen one glance of that perpetually messy mop of blonde hair and those gorgeous blue eyes and pouty lips on that tiny body and had fallen headfirst for the kid. They hadn’t been in the same circles at all and Bucky had to be content with watching him from afar. Carefully. Eventually the kid had moved or something, Bucky was never sure what, but one day he had been there and the next he’d been gone and Bucky had never seen him again. Had hated his own cowardice and stupidity had kept him from ever speaking to the tiny blonde while he’d had the chance and then all of the sudden it was too late.

And he was doing it again, wasn’t he? Being a coward? No. He was being smart. Nothing good ever came from starting a relationship with the boss. Aside from awesome sex. There were too many complications and Bucky couldn’t let himself feel anything more than what he already did. He hated the fact that even though he didn’t want to feel close or get close to Steve it seemed like he was anyway. From the two sketches Steve had given him with their amazing detail, and what little of him he’d seen, to the twins chattering away mindlessly about their dad and the stuff he always did with them. He couldn’t do it. He couldn’t take that chance. He liked this job and he adored the kids. It was so much better than whatever mission Natasha would have gotten for him.

He’d much rather take care of a couple kids for less than a fourth of what the mission would have paid. The money would have been good, but this was so much better. He had always adored children. They were his one weakness. Well, next to kitten and puppy videos on YouTube, but no one could ever find out about those. Anyone aside from Natasha that was, because she had always known and would randomly send him links to videos when she was away. As if she didn’t have a job of her own to be doing. Though he doubted anyone would give her shit for it. No, most everyone was scared of Natasha. He was still almost certain she’d killed a man with her pinkie once. She had definitely John Wick-ed someone with a pencil one time though. He had too once, but that was beside the point. Not that he was even sure he had one at this point.

“Mr. Barnes?”

“Hmm?” He blinked back into awareness and saw the twins watching him worriedly. “What’s up?”

“We only have two math problems to finish and we’ll be done.”

“Okay.”

“And we have to pick the carrots today. It says so on the calendar.” She pointed over his shoulder to a calendar he’d never noticed before and he smiled seeing a carrot shaped sticker in the little square for the date.

“I don’t know how to pick them.”

“I’ll show you.”

“Okay. Let’s get this finished up and I’ll look over your papers and then we’ll pick your carrots.”

***

Bucky grinned to himself as he held the water hose so the twins could wash the dark soil from their carrots. His hand twitched and sprayed Alexa who screamed and then giggled hysterically when he sprayed her brother next. “I am so sorry. That was an accident.” He grinned again, putting his thumb over the end of the hose to pressurize the spray and hosed them and their carrots down while they giggled and screamed. Hopefully Steve wouldn’t get upset with them for playing in the water in their school clothes. Or for playing in the water in general. It was plenty warm outside though so they shouldn’t get ill from it.

Clumps of mud dripped from the carrots the twins held in the hands, dropping on their shoes and the grass at their feet. He grinned hosing their shoes off then yelped when the twins shared a look that he’d seen on Natasha’s face plenty of times before. He was in so much trouble. He dropped the hose the second they dropped their vegetables and took off across the yard not fully realizing how long the water hose was until he was drenched and laughing just as much as the twins were. Alexi sprayed him right in the face and he coughed and sputtered then dropped into a defensive stance with a playful glare. Alexa screamed and her brother yelped and dropped the hose then took off running. Bucky ran after them, slower than he could have, and swiped the hose chasing them across the yard with it until they were completely soaked from head to toe and begging for mercy.

Bucky laughed then went to turn the water hose off at the faucet that was built into the side of the house and he gulped when he saw Steve standing in the doorway with his arms crossed over his muscled chest and now wearing a t-shirt that was at least three sizes too small and a pair of baggy jeans instead of the khakis and button down he’d been wearing when he answered the door.

“I can explain.” What even was that look on Steve’s face? He looked torn between anger, amusement, and constipation. Bucky stifled a laugh at that. He didn’t want to piss Steve off more than what he already possibly was.

“You can?”

“Yeah. We picked the carrots and then we were washing them and my hand twitched.” He wiggled the fingers of his left hand, trying to pretend that it had malfunctioned and Steve’s lips twitched then settled back into their almost frown. “And I accidently sprayed the twins and then they went crazy and got me back. It was all purely accidental. The first bit anyway.”

“Was it, now?”

Bucky nodded, trying his best not to laugh as the twins nodded in agreement with him.

“It was, Daddy! Honest!” Alexa giggled, not helping their case any and Steve rolled his eyes at his twins then reached over with one arm and grabbed a stack of towels. He tossed them each one and watched bemusedly as they dried off as much as they were able.

“Leave your shoes outside and then I want you all to go clean up and put some dry clothes on.”

Bucky smiled down at the twins as he draped the towel over his shoulders then went to pick up their carrots as they kicked off their shoes and went into the house, squeezing past their father. He handed them to Steve then backed away quickly at the look in the blonde’s eyes. He looked…not mad, but maybe upset. Bucky wasn’t sure what that look was as Steve looked him over from head to toe like he wasn’t quite sure what to make of him. That was good though, he guessed. He didn’t want to get too close.

“I’m sorry if the twins weren’t supposed to play in the water. It was just…I couldn’t help myself? I always loved playing in the water as a kid and it just sorta…happened.”

“It’s fine, Bucky.” Steve murmured after clearing his throat and looking over Bucky’s shoulder instead of meeting his eyes. “I um…I probably have some clothes you can wear so you don’t stay soppy until you leave.” He scratched the back of his neck awkwardly as he spoke and Bucky only blinked at him.

Oh, God. Oh, no. Bucky couldn’t wear Steve’s clothes. No way in hell was he going to do that because then he’d be surrounded Steve’s scent. Something slightly floral from their laundry soap and something earthy and musky that Bucky assumed was just Steve’s natural scent. He’d die from brain death before the end of the day if he had to wear Steve’s clothes because there wouldn’t be an ounce of blood left in his head. Well…the proper head anyway. He’d be completely NSFW and get fired.

“I’ll just go get them for you. You can get dressed in my bathroom.”

“I shouldn’t, honestly. I uh…I’ll just run home for a few minutes and then come back.”

“I’m not going to let you trek across town looking like you entered a wet t-shirt contest, Buck.” With that Steve turned on his heels and walked back into the house and through the kitchen. 

It was only belatedly that Bucky realized he was wearing a white shirt and he could probably jab someone’s eyes out with his nipples.

“Well, shit.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just wanted to say thanks for all the kudos and comments and stuff. And apologize for not replying to last chapter's comments. I haven't been feeling all that great since my surgery. I'm doing better though.
> 
> <3


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry it has taken so long for an update. I was trying to write this instead of ideas for other fics. But I worked on those finally and got chapters of those posted then, bam! I finished this chapter. So yeah. Hope you enjoy.
> 
> I know I promised a longer chapter this time around, but it didn't work out that way. Next one maybe.

Steve was going to die. He was definitely going to die. He whimpered as he dug through his closet for something that might fit Bucky, dismissing everything but the baggiest pair of jeans he owned and a grey-blue t-shirt he’d never worn before but might fit Bucky okay. They were close in size, but not that close. Although, from the way the transparent white t-shirt had clung to Bucky’s chest and stomach and the way his jeans had been stuck to him every-fucking-where they were pretty evenly matched. Bucky’s shoulders might be broader, his waist a little bit thicker, but good God those fucking thighs. It was the last thing Steve had needed to see after last night. He didn’t need more fuel for the inappropriate fire that burned through him. So probably he should give Bucky a different t-shirt. Because he had in no way picked that shirt because it matched Bucky’s eyes. So what if he’d stared at those cold eyes for longer than he should have? There weren’t any witnesses. No one could prove it.

Fuck, he was so screwed.

He had looked out the office window when he had heard the twins giggling and smiled when he saw them with soil covered carrots dangling from their hands by the leafy tops. Bucky pulled one up, shaking the dirt from it with a grin and Alexa had laughed again shaking the dirt from her own and getting it on Bucky and Alexi. They picked more, shaking them at each other until they were all three speckled with the nearly black soil. Bucky handed his few to the twins then walked over to turn the water hose on then walked back over to them to rinse the dirt from the vegetables. Steve had sighed when he saw Bucky spraying them down while they held carrots in their hands. Soaking them in their school clothes and getting mud all over them. Well, he had to do laundry anyway so it wasn’t a big deal.

No, it hadn’t been a big deal until Bucky had yelped and dropped the water hose after a shared look from the twins and then they had dropped their carrots and ran after Bucky, spraying him down with the water hose and soaking him completely. His white t-shirt had quickly turned transparent, clinging to pecs and abs and obliques and unf. Even from his office window, so far from the back yard, he had seen every inch of Bucky through that t-shirt. And if that wasn’t bad enough, his jeans clung to his thighs and crotch and ass. Not at all hiding anything they should have and holy fuck Bucky was going commando.

Now Steve was going to be lucky if he managed to get any sleep that night. Every time he closed his eyes he saw that perfect body draped in clinging fabric. He wanted to rip it off of him and take him to bed and keep him there for the foreseeable future. He whimpered again and palmed his cock, hoping it would take the hint and quit before it got him in trouble and needing a new nanny. He’d been half-hard since he’d seen Bucky the first time and he’d managed to will it away before going downstairs to bring the kids in. But now it was coming back full force since he knew they were busy and he’d seen Bucky up close, had seen how hard the brunette’s nipples were from the cool water.

Steve wanted to bite them. Wanted to warm then with his lips and tongue and hands. Oh, shit. If the water was cold then Bucky wasn’t even…oh God. His dick was huge. Steve would have no issues warming that up for him too. Or the rest of him for that matter. Steve naturally ran hot. He could definitely warm Bucky up.

“Damn it, Steve. You can’t do this. Or him. You absolutely can’t do him either. Just give him the clothes, go back to your office and go back to work. Don’t ogle him again. He’s your employee. It’s all kinds of wrong.” 

_ It could be all kinds of right too _ , that damned little voice replied.  _ You’d treat him so good. _

“No, damn it. I’m not talking to myself over this shit again. Jesus. Shut up, tiny voice.” Steve stomped out of his room, doing his best to ignore the throbbing of his erection, and made his way down the stairs and to the doorway of the kitchen. He tossed the clothes on the table; he couldn’t very well let Bucky see him like this, and then yelled for the brunette that was still standing out in the backyard.

“I got you some clothes, Buck! They should fit you. I’m going back to my office. My bedroom door’s open so you can change in there.” He waited a few seconds for Bucky’s reply then ran back up the stairs and to his office closing the door and falling into his desk chair while he pretended that Bucky wearing his clothes and changing in his bedroom didn’t turn him on nearly as much as it did. He was going to die before the day was over.

He pulled out his sketchbook, the one he’d drawn the picture of Bucky dancing in, and flipped to a blank page then grabbed a pencil from the glitter and butterfly covered Mason jar cup holder that Alexa had made him in kindergarten. Maybe sketching Bucky and the kids picking their carrots would calm him down. So long as he pretended they had never played in the water.

He heard quiet footsteps in the hallway, too quiet to be either of the twins, and gulped when he heard his bedroom door shut. Oh, fuck. Bucky was only thirty-five feet away from him, probably still dripping wet, and fixing to be nude. Even more than that though, was the idea that Bucky was fixing to be wearing his clothes. There was something primal in him, he thought, that the notion of Bucky wearing his clothes made his heart stutter and his stomach twist in knots while a rush of possessiveness and lust burned in his veins.

There could be no stomach twisting, no heart stuttering, no feelings of possessiveness. He sighed heavily then turned his music on and settled back in his chair, focusing on putting his pencil to paper and sketching the delicate lines of his twins’ faces.

***

Bucky kicked his boots off by the door then walked through the kitchen grabbing the clothes Steve had left for him on his way through and made his way upstairs hoping he wasn’t ruining the carpet. He crept down the hallway, past the closed door of Steve’s office, and down two more doors to find the open bedroom door. He hadn’t thought to wonder what Steve’s bedroom might be like, there was too much temptation in that, but what he found as he walked into the room was unexpected. It probably shouldn’t have been. There were pictures and paintings on every wall. Most of them included the twins at every stage of their lives. His favorite was a picture of a terrified but happy looking younger Steve holding the twins as infants in a hospital room. Natasha was behind him, lying on the bed and smiling tiredly, her always perfect hair matted with sweat. It was sweet. They all looked adorable. He’d never tell Natasha he’d seen the photo though. She’d probably kill him. But only after asking him how he’d gotten to be in Steve’s bedroom anyway and that would lead to a whole other discussion he’d rather not have.

He intentionally kept his gaze away from the probably orgy sized bed because that would only lead to him imagining what it would be like to be tangled up in its sheets with Steve. He sighed, realizing he was dripping water on the floor, and shuffled his way to Steve’s ensuite. The gleaming white tiles and chrome fixtures threw him for a minute as he dumped Steve’s clothes on the counter next to the sinks. His and Hers sinks. Which one did Steve use? Soaps, an old fashioned straight razor, and bottles of product were scattered around, neatly like everything else, but still scattered. There was no one side to the double sink. Of course, there didn’t really need to be, did there? Steve was single, terminally from the looks of things, and his stuff stretched across the counter and both sinks.

It would be easier for Bucky if Steve wasn’t single. If he had some pretty husband or wife here to keep Bucky from getting too invested. Of course if he had the pretty spouse then Bucky wouldn’t be here at all. Which, honestly, would suck because he enjoyed spending time with the twins, but would be so much easier on his head and heart. Not that his heart had anything to do with it. It didn’t. Totally did not. There was no heart involved. None whatsoever. He definitely did not want to be the pretty husband in this imaginary scenario. It was sad enough his life was turning into a bad imaginary porno. He couldn’t be the husband and the nanny too.

He dropped the wet towel that he’d had draped over his shoulders in the sink then stripped out of his clothes and held them as he tried to decide what to do with them. Did he leave them in the floor? Toss them in the giant bathtub that was big enough to hold him and Steve at the same time? Take them outside? Was Steve planning on washing them? Did Bucky need to cart them with him everywhere until he went home dressed in Steve’s clothes? 

Oh, God. Natasha would see him in Steve’s clothes and get  _ Ideas _ .  _ Ideas _ she didn’t need to be getting. Maybe she’d be gone again when he got home. As if he’d ever be that lucky. No, knowing his luck she’d be waiting at the door for him with some all-knowing smirk and a comment about him coming home dressed in Steve’s clothes. He knew he was being ridiculous again, okay? He knew it. It still didn’t help him not be.

He finally tossed the clothes in the shower to keep the floor from getting soaked then tossed the towel in after. He stared at Steve’s clothes that sat so innocuously on the sink for a lot longer than he should have. The smedium grey-blue shirt that almost exactly matched Bucky’s eyes, and had Steve picked it out on purpose? But that would mean Steve had looked at his eyes enough to know what color they were beyond just being blue and that was a whole other reason to panic so yeah, no. He wasn’t going to focus on that no matter how badly his twisted up brain wanted to. The baggy jeans that Bucky was pretty sure were the threadbare ones that were covered in paint that Steve had worn the day Bucky had nearly had his heart attack. 

He was going to die. He couldn’t help but picture Steve in them and then himself and even though he was slightly chilled from the water and then coming inside under the air conditioning Little Bucky decided to make his presence known. Apparently Little Bucky liked the idea of Big Bucky wearing Steve’s clothes too. He was seriously going to die. At least get brain damage or something because it was one thing to imagine Steve in the outfit and quite another for Bucky to realize that he’d be going commando under Steve’s jeans and what the hell 15 year old Bucky that popped into 35 year old Bucky’s head? Jesus, it’s not like he was getting Steve’s letter jacket.  _ Down boy. _

He needed to hurry the fuck up and get dressed and get back to the twins. He wasn’t being paid to stand nude in Steve’s bathroom with a fucking boner. Although, he wouldn’t be opposed to standing naked for Steve at some point and letting him draw him. He didn’t even have to get paid. Not in cash anyway. Little Bucky twitched at that and Big Bucky groaned and rolled his eyes.  _ Sorry, my dude. Now is not the time. _

He finally got dressed; doing some creative rearranging of certain body parts and absolutely did not in any way smell the t-shirt and inhale the scent of Steve’s laundry detergent as he pulled the shirt over his head. Nope, never happened. There were no witnesses. You couldn’t prove it.

The smedium shirt clung to his shoulders and biceps, stretched across his chest letting anyone within a 10 feet radius see his obscenely perky nipples, and clung to his stomach. Whoever let Steve buy his own clothes needed a medal for exemplary service to their country and then punched in the face, because now Bucky was imagining this look on Steve and unf.  _ Bad, bad, brain. _ Steve’s jeans fit him a bit more snuggly than they did Steve. Bucky’s waist a little bit thicker but who else would have that teeny tiny waist besides Steve? That shoulder to hip ratio was unnatural. Perfect, and amazing, and gorgeous, but unnatural. The worn and super comfy denim stretched over Bucky’s thighs and he was half afraid he’d tear a seam if he stepped wrong. Still it was better than wearing wet clothes the rest of the day and hopefully Natasha would be gone when he got home so he wouldn’t have to explain to her why he was wearing Steve’s clothes.

First though he needed to ask Steve what he was supposed to do with his clothes. He did not need to see Steve right this minute, but he still didn’t know if he should just leave his clothes in Steve’s bath or if he should cart them with him and find a bag to stick them in in the kitchen. Although he’d seen a distinct lack of plastic bags in his time there. Unicorn Art Stripper Steve probably used those reusable canvas grocery bags when he went shopping, the heavy cotton ones not the crappy recycled plastic ones. Those tore up more often than not.

He sighed and made his way out of Steve’s room before he could talk himself out of seeing Steve. He was an adult. In theory anyway. He could do this. He could go into Steve’s office, use his Winter Soldier iciness as a camouflage and ask what he should do with his clothes without it being weird. It wasn’t weird. Nothing about this was weird. He was just wearing the clothes of a man he was in lust with and that was that. That’s all it was, borrowing clothes. He was fine. Totally fine. 

When he lifted his hand to knock on Steve’s office door he realized how totally not fine he was because he was fixing to see Steve again and he was wearing Steve’s clothes and he was fixing to panic, but fuck he had to get back to the twins before something happened. He took a steadying breath and barely managed to school his expression and nerves into something resembling normalcy before opening the door to Steve’s office not even taking notice of the music blaring from the room until it practically knocked him on his ass. How the fuck did Steve manage to have his music that loud and still function? 

He looked to the blonde and saw him bent over a sketchpad that rested on the desk and scratching a pencil over the paper quickly, almost desperately, like he was trying to hurry up and finish whatever it was that he was working on before he lost the image in his head. He wondered what Steve was sketching this time but was too chicken shit to go check for himself. He didn’t want to get too close to Steve right now, especially since he was wearing the blonde’s clothes. It was too domestic. He’d just leave his own in the shower.

He backed out of the office, closing the door quietly, not that it really mattered he figured what with Steve’s music blaring so loud and made his way down to the kitchen to see the twins, his tiny ginger partners in crime, looking at the menu for the Chinese place they loved so much. They had washed up and changed their clothes in the time that he’d spent day dreaming in their father’s bedroom and creeping on him in his office when he’d been completely unaware of Bucky standing in the doorway watching him draw with an intensity that had Bucky curious about what he was drawing and why. Was there going to be another apology sketch? Was it just a sketch in general? Why had Steve been so flushed while he’d sketched? Why was he drawing so aggressively?

The twins finally noticed him and grinned. He shook himself then walked over to them and listened intently as they started reading him the menu.

***

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Steve groaned slapping his pencil down on the sketchpad and sat back from the desk. He wasn’t getting shit done except irritating himself because he was frustrated and no matter how he tried to lighten the strokes of the pencil on the paper the lines came out too heavy and dark. It didn’t at all fit the sketch of the twins and Bucky picking their carrots. They all had serene smiles on their faces, but they looked kind of creepy with the dark jagged lines instead of the delicate sweep they should have had.

Fuck! He had to figure something out. He couldn’t keep lusting after Bucky. Not to this level of distraction. He hadn’t even really started going through his emails or any damn thing else. No, because his brain and body were too busy fucking torturing him with what he couldn’t fucking have.

“Damn it.” He pressed the heels of his hands into his eyes and took a few steadying breaths, trying to calm himself down. When all he could see were speckles of light when he blinked his eyes open he picked up the sketchpad again and drew a sprig of Baby’s Breath for innocence and pure of heart for the twins. He tapped the pencil against the edge of the page in thought before adding a Burdock burr with its purple flower in Bucky’s hair, changing it so some of the strands were tangled in it. Touch me not was all the advice he could give himself. In the bottom corner, almost hidden in a pile of carrots was a White Columbine for folly. This whole situation was folly.

He needed to talk to someone about this. Someone that wouldn’t judge him for being supremely fucking stupid over a man he didn’t know and wasn’t sure he wanted to know. Okay, that was a lie. He wanted to know Bucky. Wanted to know everything about him, but it just wasn’t possible. He already felt he was in too deep just wishing for Bucky’s smiles directed at him instead of the glares and panic. He needed to nip whatever was happening to him in the bud. He needed to talk to Sam. Sam would know what to do. Besides, he couldn’t tell Natasha any of it. She’d just laugh at him for being stupid, for already being in too deep over a man that was a total dick to him and it  _ wasn’t allowed _ . She’d definitely never let him hear the end of it if he told her he was sort of maybe (not at all damn it) falling (in lust) for his douchebag of a nanny. 

Sam would help him figure out what to do because he couldn’t fire Bucky just to be rid of the temptation. He also couldn’t sleep with someone in his employ. And he couldn’t just freaking jerk off every night after Bucky left either. Well, he could. And had. And probably would again. But the guilt was still eating at him. He felt like a creepy pervert, but God it had been incredible. So yeah, he needed to talk to Sam. Soon. The next day during lunch at work.  They’d at least get to cover the basics and Steve needed Sam’s calming presence desperately.

“Shit.” He turned his music off, the sudden silence in his office deafening, then pushed the sketchpad aside and lifted the screen of his laptop. He had to get shit done.

Later he only realized how late it had gotten while he was helping some of his students when the twins came into his office already dressed in their pajamas and each of them holding a book in their hands. He’d missed dinner again, which wasn’t fine but it wasn’t the first time this week, but he’d also missed reminding his babies to get ready for bed and to brush their teeth. Bucky had even French braided Alexa’s hair and tied a ribbon bow at the end.

“God. I’m so sorry.” He scrubbed his hands over his face with a heavy sigh.

“It’s okay, Daddy. Mr. Bucky didn’t mind. We figured you was busy.”

Mr. Bucky? Freaking adorable, but no. “Mr. Barnes and I was. I’m sorry, babies. I should’ve gotten done sooner so I could get you guys.”

“We know you’re busy,” Alexi murmured, hugging his book to his chest.

“I shouldn’t be too busy to get you guys ready for bed. I’ll do better tomorrow. I promise.” He’d have to. He couldn’t keep doing this shit. It wasn’t fair to the twins. It wasn’t fair to himself. He hated missing so much of them this time of year. He should have just done without hiring a nanny like he always had. He should have dealt with being sleep deprived and a little cranky like he did every year. He had thought that hiring a nanny would help him. Probably it would have if Bucky hadn’t been so fucking gorgeous. So technically this was all Natasha’s fault. She’d been the one to send him Bucky. She had said he had a clean record and was good with kids. What else could Steve have wanted? Besides someone that looked like a toad apparently. 

“Come on, go get in bed while I see Mr. Barnes out and then we’ll go read before bed. I’ll read you a couple extra stories tonight.” It wouldn’t make up for him being a practical failure at managing a career, his twins, and his stupid crush, but it might help. Besides, there was always bribery. He was a mature adult. He was pretty sure it was perfectly fine to bribe your children in times of emergency. Probably. He winced as he watched the twins walk into their bedroom. His mother would kill him if she knew he thought that.

He caught sight of Bucky walking out of his bedroom and started to snap at him, because what the fuck, he did not need more of those images especially not with Bucky wearing his clothes and walking around barefoot, but then he saw Bucky holding his sodden clothes and kept his mouth shut. He knew if he opened it now it would only lead to him asking Bucky to stay for reasons he didn’t want to deal with.

“I uh…had to get my clothes.” Bucky wiggled the pile of clothes with a weak smile.

“It’s fine,” Steve squeaked.

“I’ll see you tomorrow, Steve.”

“Yeah.” Steve nodded, hoping Bucky didn’t notice the way his voice cracked again. Was that the first time Bucky had called him Steve instead of Rogers? No, no he’d called him Steve before. Only a couple times that he could remember, though. Not that it mattered. It definitely did not matter (how dare you thump like that heart!) that Douchebag Barnes had called him Steve. “Goodnight, Bucky.”

The brunette nodded then walked past him and Steve turned to watch as he practically ran down the stairs and into the kitchen. He came back out seconds later carrying his boots and went out the front door. Steve shook his head with a heavy sigh then ducked into the twins’ room to tell them he was going to lock up for the night and then he’d be back to read to them. He had to talk to Sam and get his head on straight. He couldn’t keep doing this.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sam finally shows in the next chapter, which luckily for you guys, is partially written.


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A wild Sam appears. Steve has a startling revelation. The demon spawn show their true colors. (Not really, but it sounds good.) Bucky has a revelation of his own, but not quite the same caliber as Steve's.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Y'all get 6.3k this time. 
> 
> Some may have noticed my notes, final chapter number, and tags going crazy the past week or so. I may or may not have had a slight panic issue over this that ended with me almost dropping this completely and then ultimately deciding not to. Y'all were also _this_ close to only getting two more chapters, one of which would have been a short epilogue. But that didn't happen, so yay.
> 
> Also, I only did the bare minimum of editing on this, but I wanted to get it posted since I'm so far behind. If you see anything glaringly wrong let me know and I'll fix it. <3

Steve didn’t have to hunt Sam down during lunch. He’d spent all morning lost in his own head and letting his students do whatever they wanted. Again. He hadn’t gone over any of their assignments, hadn’t encouraged or taught, hadn’t done anything but sit and brood at his sketchpad. In the end he hadn’t even needed to hunt Sam down because Sam came to his classroom before he could get up the nerve to go to Sam’s office and tell him everything. Apparently some of his students had told on him because he’d been acting unlike himself. Which, okay, he was, but even so he didn’t think he’d gotten bad enough that the students he was torturing for finals would be concerned about him.

“Okay, Steve. What’s going on?”

“Nothing,” he answered automatically. Sam only narrowed his eyes as he kicked the door shut and locked it then walked to Steve’s desk. “Yeah, I know.” Steve sighed, slumping down in his chair. He didn’t even know where to begin now that he was actually facing Sam. It seemed so damn complicated and he didn’t know what the hell to do. Sam sat on the edge of his desk and stared down at him.

“I’ve had ten of your students in my office today alone wondering if I could talk to you because something isn’t right. They’re worried about you, which means you’ve been brooding and standoffish lately. Which also explains why you’ve barely talked to me the past couple weeks. Is it the twins? Did they realize Natasha’s their mom?”

“She’s their birth mother, not their mom, and no. Not yet.”

“They're going to figure it out on their own anyway.

“I know.” Steve whined and Sam sighed. “I’ll sit them down and talk to them eventually. They’re smart kids; they probably already have a feeling. I mean, where the hell else did that red hair come from?”

“True. So what’s going on?”

“I want to fuck my nanny.”

Sam blinked at him in shock a long moment and Steve groaned knowing what was coming when Sam grinned. “Well, you are a middle class white suburban dad.”

“That’s stereotyping, Wilson.”

“Oh, I know. This is great!”

“No! No it’s not. I can’t. He’s a fucking douche anyway, just…gah!” Steve tangled his fingers in his hair and Sam sighed heavily. 

Steve looked so damn miserable. There was something else there besides apparently wanting to fuck his nanny. Just how hot was this guy? And what the hell had happened to Steve? He’d never been this torn up over a guy before. He was Mr. Oblivious most days. Sam had had to tell him several times over the course of their friendship that guys were flirting with him. For some reason Steve never realized it until it was too late to do anything about it. And the times that Sam had told him he was being flirted with he’d only blushed and ducked his head claiming that he’d missed the opportunity. 

Deep inside that 6’2” muscled up body was the tiny scrawny 16 year old that never had a hope of getting a date. There were so many dates Steve could have gone on but his flirt radar sucked. Sam had seen someone blatantly ask Steve out and the man hadn’t realized it until he’d already made a fool of himself by not realizing what they were actually asking. Sam had tried not to laugh at him and had smoothed things over when the guy asking Steve out had gotten irritated. They still didn’t go out on a date though. Steve hadn’t had a single relationship that meant anything since the twins were born. He’d go out and hook up when he got desperate, which had happened all of twice, but that was about it. So what was it about the nanny that had Steve this torn up?

“If he’s a douche why are you torn up over him? Is it because he’s a douche? Is he your bad boy, Steve?”

“No! Yes! I don’t know! He’s a dick. Oh my god, he’s such a dick. But he’s so amazing with the kids. Look.” 

Steve handed Sam the sketchpad after flipping to the beginning of it and Sam raised a brow when he saw a sketch of the twins standing at their garden and pointing something out to a tall handsome brunette with a metal arm and holy shit, that was Steve’s nanny? Jesus, no wonder Steve was conflicted. 

Yeah, Sam was hetero, but he was secure enough in his masculinity that he wasn’t afraid to admit that the dude was fine. He flipped to the next page and saw the twins and the nanny at the jungle gym, flipped again and saw them on the slide, the nanny smiling brightly. There was a sketch of the twins hanging from the monkey bars on their play set while the nanny stood underneath them waiting to catch them in case they fell. All three of them with huge smiles on their faces. He saw a small flower sketched into the bottom corner. 

_ Oh, no. Oh, Steve. _ The next page was a sketch of the kids doing their homework and the nanny leaned over the table, reading from a book, his hair was coming out of its bun, a lock of it kissing the corner of his mouth. Another flower was in the corner, this one Sam actually knew what it was, a zinnia for lasting affection. Poor Steve. In love and too stupid to realize it. Of course he was. Sam finished going through the sketches, each one of them breaking his heart a little bit more because now he knew what was wrong with Steve and it wasn’t something he could help him with. Not really. He came across the final sketch in the book, drawn with angry lines that belied the pixie-like delicate lines of the twin’s faces but accentuated the angled jaw on the nanny. There were three flowers drawn on the paper this time, one close to the twins, one tangled in the nanny’s hair and one half hidden under a pile of carrots. Sam recognized Baby’s Breath, who didn’t? and knew it meant innocence. That one was definitely for the twins, but he didn’t know the other two.

“What are these other flowers, Steve?”

“The one in Bucky’s hair is Burdock and the one under the carrots is a Columbine.”

“And what do they mean?”

“The uh…Columbine is white for uh…folly.”

“And the Burdock?”

“Touch me not.”

“Steve?” The blonde looked half afraid and half depressed. “Have you tried talking to him?”

“He won’t talk to me! We barely say two words to each other and when we do it’s usually him being an asshole.”

“Why’s he still working for you,” he asked.

“Because the twins adore him, because he’s so amazing with them. I can tell he cares about them. I mean…hell, you saw the sketches! Look how happy he looks with them! He’s never smiled at me like that!” Steve pulled at his hair with a whimper then leaned forward and dropped his head to his desk next to Sam’s hip. Sam patted his head consolingly and sat the sketchpad aside.

“You’re going to have to try to talk to him. Even if he’s a complete dick, he might have a reason for it.”

“What possible reason could he have? He’s such an asshole.”

“Pulling your pigtails.”

“I don’t have pigtails, Sam.” Steve sat up and stared at him like he was crazy. Sam rolled his eyes.

“Your metaphorical pigtails.”

“Sam, I really don't see what pigtails have to do with grown men.”

“You never pulled a girl's pigtails?”

“No! That's rude!” Steve looked so scandalized that Sam laughed.

“Little boys are mean to girls they have crushes on, Steve.”

“I never had crushes on girls so I don’t have any pigtail pulling experience.” The one woman he’d slept with didn’t count as a crush. No, he’d never had a crush on Natasha.

“He’s mean to you because he likes you.”

“No. He’s just a dick. A gorgeous dick that would walk right past me on the sidewalk and not piss on me if I was on fire.”

“Dude, that’s graphic, but whatever. Talk to him before he leaves work tonight, okay?”

“I can’t. I can’t even say anything to him. I get all tongue tied and it’s really awkward because he either stares at me like I’m something that needs to be dissected or like he’s terrified of me.” 

Sam sighed and slid off the desk then wrapped Steve up in a tight hug. “This, whatever this is, won’t get resolved if you don’t talk to him.”

“Yeah. Okay. I’ll try.” He wasn’t going to try. He and Sam both knew he wouldn’t try to talk shit out. Not like it would matter if he did anyway. Bucky would never give him the time of day. Not even enough for Steve to tell him he adored him. Which would be a horrible mistake. He’d either scare Bucky away, he didn’t even know if the brunette liked men or not, or Bucky would punch him in the face and quit his job, walking away from the twins. No, it was better that Steve never talked to Bucky about how he felt. It couldn’t happen anyway. Bucky was first and foremost his employee. Nothing could or would happen between them. No matter how badly Steve wanted it to.

***

Steve didn’t feel any better by the time he got home, but maybe a little more centered. All he had to do was keep reminding himself that Bucky was off limits. It didn’t matter if Bucky liked men or not. Nothing could happen and that was that. Steve would just learn to be content with his lot in life like he had before Bucky had shown up on his doorstep looking grungy and perfect and gorgeous. It was fine. He was fine. He was fine not being in a relationship. He liked not having to worry about how his children would react to him being in a relationship. He was fine not having to worry about how a potential significant other would react to learning he had children. Really, it was fine. Bucky didn’t mean anything to him other than he was his demon babies’ nanny. They weren’t even friends. Were barely acquaintances. It was fine. He was calm and cool and collected and his babies were happy and he would be happy because they were happy. 

He was so far in denial his head was spinning.

He was not at all calm, cool, or collected when Bucky knocked on the door and Steve opened it to find the brunette holding the clothes he’d borrowed to his chest. He bit back a whimper as he took the clothes, catching the scent of Bucky’s laundry detergent and cologne. They’d been washed and dried and Steve knew that it was definitely Bucky’s laundry detergent because Natasha always used the perfume free, dye free detergents because she was allergic to the others. 

“Thank you for letting me borrow your clothes. I uh, washed ‘em and stuff.”

“It’s fine. Really. Um, come in.” He stepped aside and let Bucky in, hugging his clothes to his chest to keep from reaching out to him. He could do this. It was fine. It was great. He could do it. He was a grown man, not a fumbling hormonal teenage boy. At least he had been until the scent of detergent and cologne hit his nose. Or, rather, he had been until he’d answered the door to Bucky the first time.

Bucky’s detergent and cologne did not remind Steve of walking in the woods after the first rain in a long time. Didn’t remind him of soft undergrowth or the scent of packed down leaves and plants being stirred around by footsteps. The scent rising up from the crushed plant life. Rich dark soil and new green things reaching for that small amount of sunlight that filtered through the thick leaves overhead.

He jolted when Bucky gave him a weak smile and stepped into the house. Oh, shit. It wasn’t just lust anymore was it? He’d gone and fallen in love with the asshole. Holy shit. This couldn’t happen. This very much could not happen. He was so fucked.

“You alright, Rogers? You look a little bit peaky.”

Steve blinked and shook his head. He was far from all right. “I’m fine. Kids are in the kitchen.” He tucked tail and ran leaving Bucky standing in the doorway.

***

What the hell just happened? Bucky sighed heavily, watching Steve run up the stairs then shook his head as he closed the door. Was Steve being pissy about him wearing his clothes? He’d been the one to insist Bucky wear them home. And thank God that Natasha had been gone when he’d gotten back to her place. He’d have never heard the end of it from her if she saw him wearing Steve’s clothes. There’d have been so much innuendo. So, so much innuendo.  And probably not just innuendo. She’d think he and Rogers were sleeping together. Accuse him of sleeping with Steve even though his fucked up not-relationship with Stark was why he’d given up what would have been a great career. 

He wished he was sleeping with Rogers. It’d give him an excuse to see him for more than three seconds at a time that didn’t involve him sniping or being a smartass. He was still amazed he hadn’t been fired yet. Anyone else would have gotten rid of him day one. But not Steve. No. He had to be some kind of paragon of righteousness or virtue or some shit. Rogers was too decent for his own fucking good. It drove Bucky insane that no matter how much of a dick he was, Rogers pretty much ignored it and went about his business, leaving Bucky to take care of the twins. He never sniped back, was never rude or bitchy with him when he clearly had reason to be. He’d just get this look on his face like he was disappointed, although it wasn’t Disappointed Dad Face because Bucky had ample experience with that one, and then go into his office to work until time for dinner or time to get the twins in bed.

Except for the night before. Why hadn’t Steve gotten the twins ready? Bucky hadn’t even realized how late it had been until Alexa had started yawning after homework, dinner, and Go Fish. Bucky had herded the twins up the stairs, having them get ready for bed even though they’d whined that their daddy always came to get them and have them get ready. Just the once, he’d promised them. So Steve had better get his shit together or it would break Bucky’s promise. Alexa had asked him if he knew how to braid hair and had grinned and grabbed her brush and a length of ribbon. He’d French braided her hair and tied it off with the ribbon and an extra hair tie he’d had around his wrist.

After that he’d gotten tired of waiting on Steve to come get the twins even though he should have waited because Steve’d probably been working still and had sent the twins to go get their daddy. It was their bedtime and Bucky knew Steve always got them ready for bed. He’d never been late to it before, at least not since Bucky had started working. What was wrong with Steve?

Bucky hoped it wasn’t something he had done. He figured Rogers would tell him though, if it was. And he couldn’t ask the twins because that would be so wrong. He was not going to, nor would he ever, use a child to get to their parent. He could be an adult and go ask, but it was too hard. He was still stupid and tongue tied around Rogers unless he was being mean to him. Fuck it. Steve was weird.

He walked into the kitchen to find the twins sat at the table with their math books out. “Ugh.”

“Yep.” Alexa grinned up at him and sat up straight. “This lesson’s got music in it!”

“Really?”

“Yep! It’s got form, rhythm, and meter and stuff in it. But we haven’t had any music lessons.”

“You don’t have band at school?”

“Not yet. Next year.” Alexi murmured. “And they’ll have piano for the after school program, but we don’t know if Daddy’ll let us do it or not cause it’ll be longer school days and we already have the garden and stuff.”

“And your daddy misses you when you’re gone.” Bucky knew that would influence Steve’s decision more than the longer school days would. He knew Steve wanted the twins to have anything they wanted, within reason, but Bucky also knew that Steve wanted to spend every minute he could with the twins before they grew up and decided  they were too cool to spend time with their old man. It was coming. A few more years and the twins wouldn’t need him at their beck and call.

“Yeah.”

“Well, you might be in luck.”

“Yeah?”

“Yep, because I can play the piano.” He’d had ten years of music lessons when he was a kid. It had been awhile since he’d actually sat and played but surely it wouldn’t be too hard to pick back up. “I mean, we don’t have a piano handy, but I know how to play.”

“Cool!”

Bucky grinned watching the twins bounce in their seats.

“Let’s see if music can make this math lesson suck less.” He sat at the table and pulled Alexa’s book over to him and began to read over the lesson. Nope. Music wasn’t going to help. What the fuck was up with math nowadays? Christ, it was so dull. Why couldn’t they have science instead? “Bad news, it’s not gonna help. Good news, it should be really easy. You two have anything else aside from Math?”

“Alexi has reading and I’ve got one problem left on my science but I don’t need help with it.”

“Okay. Let’s get started.”

***

They’d finished homework and gone outside to play. Bucky was supervising the twins chasing each other through the yard from the swing set and couldn’t help but glance up at the window to see if Steve was watching them again. So far he hadn’t caught him. He wasn’t sure if he was happy about that or not. It still made him slightly paranoid to know that Steve watched them, but he’d almost gotten used to the idea of it. Not because Steve didn’t trust him with the twins, he obviously did at this point, but because maybe Steve got some sense of relief in being able to watch his children playing happily. Bucky hoped anyway. Relief or relaxation or something because Steve had seemed pretty high strung the past few days. 

Bucky heard a scream and launched himself off of the swing set and looked back to the twins before he could register that it was an infuriated scream instead of one of fear or pain. The twins were wrestling on the ground, Alexa pinning her brother down with his arm wrenched behind his back with one arm, a knee in the small of his back, and her other arm pressing against the back of his neck to keep him face down in the grass. “Jesus! Alexa!” Bucky rushed over and pulled her off of her brother, sitting her aside and then carefully rolled Alexi over to check on him. “You okay?” Alexi groaned as he sat up then launched himself at his sister and tackling her to the ground before Bucky could stop him. Jesus they were quick. Bucky stood up and spun toward the twins then pulled them apart and stood between them. “What are you doing!”

Both of the twins started yelling over the top of each other and he thanked his lucky stars he’d been an only child.

“Lexi hit me!”

“It was an accident!”

“No it wasn’t!”

English flew out the window as they yelled at each other; their strange language of French and Russian mixed together coming back and Bucky wondered if they used it in place of that made up language that most twins had when they were babies.

“Okay, that’s enough!” He didn’t know if he should put them in corners or make them apologize to each other or what. He and Steve hadn’t had any conversation about punishments should the twins get out of hand, but Bucky wasn’t comfortable with punishing someone else’s kids anyway. Come to think of it the only rules that Steve had given them at the beginning was that they should always listen to Bucky, they could only order out once a week, which Bucky hadn’t been overly religious about following, and that they shouldn’t be allowed to rob a bank or a Candy Craze. “Come on.” 

Bucky put a hand on each of their shoulders and led them back to the house wondering where they hell they’d learned to fight like that. Steve or Natasha one. Probably Natasha. She seemed the more likely one to teach the kids how to fight, but probably it was only supposed to be used as self-defense and not to beat each other up. But, they were ten. Siblings tended to fight. He sat Alexa on one side of the table and Alexi on the other.

“Now, you’re going to sit here and be quiet and I’m going to go get your daddy.” They nodded, still glaring at each other and when he turned to leave the kitchen he saw Steve standing in the doorway with his arms crossed over his chest causing his pecs to bunch up and Bucky couldn’t help the inappropriate thought that he really wanted to nip them and leave little lavender bruises all over them. Steve blinked at him then sighed and walked into the kitchen, dropping his arms and ending Bucky’s show. Shit, Bucky really needed to not do that.

“I heard the fight.”

“Oh. Yeah. I just…I didn’t catch them in time.” He stepped out of the way as Steve walked to the table where the twins were sat. 

“It’s okay, Buck. They’re quick. It’s that red hair you know? Soulless ginger demon babies.” Steve gave him a crooked smile and Bucky snorted out a quiet laugh as he watched Steve walk to the end of the table. The twins were already looking contrite and Bucky wondered how much of it was for show and how much was real. If they were anything like their mother and what he knew of their father it was mostly for show.

“Now, I want to know, in short precise sentences what you two think you were doing fighting like that.” Both twins started to speak and he held a hand up to silence them. “One at a time.”

Alexi opened his mouth to speak and Alexa glared at him until he closed it.

“Me and Lexi were playing. He started chasing me with a slug! And I told him to quit but he didn’t and then he hit me. So I maybe kind of pinned him down like Auntie Tasha showed us and Mr. Bucky broke us up but then Lexi tackled me and stuff.”

Figures. He had a feeling Rogers might be calling Natasha later to let her know either that her training worked or he was gonna kick her ass for teaching the twins in the first place. Bucky could practically feel the disappointment rolling off of Steve in waves. Whether it was aimed toward the twins, Natasha, or himself, Bucky wasn’t sure. Knowing what little he did of Steve he figured the disappointment was aimed at himself. It didn’t have that Disappointed Dad vibe and if Steve knew Natasha as well as Bucky did, which he probably knew her even better considering she’d given birth to his twins, then he knew that being disappointed in Natasha wasn’t something most people did.

“Lexa.”

“I know, Daddy. Self-defense only, but technically it was self-defense because he was chasing me around with that icky slimy slug and then he hit me.”

“Uh huh.” Steve looked to his son and Lexi sat up straighter and glared at his sister one last time before looking up to meet his father’s gaze.

“We were playing and I saw the slug in the grass and chased Lexa with it ‘cause it was funny and I accidently hit her with it so she sucker punched me and then I hit her back and then she pinned me like Auntie Tasha showed us.”

Bucky was starting to be disappointed he’d missed the fight honestly. He had a feeling that the little scrap was more Steve’s style than Natasha’s. He figured that Steve was scrappy as fuck and took every cheap shot he could. Natasha did too, but for some reason Bucky saw Steve as a tiny scrappy kid that took all the cheap shots when he’d been a kid. Steve reminded Bucky of that little artsy twink he’d been in love with in high school now that he thought about it. Similar blonde hair and stubborn jaw, similar blue eyes and crooked nose. But it couldn’t be. Steve, muscled up, six feet two inches of hotness, couldn’t be that kid. Not unless he’d had a major growth spurt after he’d disappeared. It wasn’t possible for someone to grow that much, was it? Steve Rogers was not that kid that constantly got his ass handed to him for running his mouth.

God that kid had gotten his ass beat so much for talking shit and getting between the bullies and their other victims. It had only made Bucky adore him more. The one time Bucky had tried to defend him he’d gotten socked in the mouth by the little blonde so he hadn’t tried again and had stayed away from him for fear of becoming the bullies’ next target. He’d been a dumb scared kid. If he had it to do over again he’d have saved the little guy every chance he could no matter what it cost him because as it turned out none of those assholes on any of the sports teams he’d played on meant anything in the long run. He hadn’t seen any of them since high school and by the time Bucky had finally come into himself he and they had been long gone from each other’s lives. The only person he wished he’d been able to get in touch with was that tiny, mouthy blonde that definitely couldn’t be his current employer. Could it?

He edged closer to the table to see Steve’s face better and frowned thoughtfully. The hair was different, a little darker than the kid in school. Shorter now than it had been. Back then his bangs had been long enough to fall into his eyes. Gorgeous baby blues that Bucky had seen from down the hallway. Baby blues that were the exact same shade as Steve’s, but seriously, there was no telling how many people had blue eyes like that. His nose had been broken at least twice judging by the little bump on it, but Bucky had a feeling it had been quite a few times more than that and had been set afterward instead of left to heal crookedly. That stubborn sexy jaw even looked the same. Shit, Steve really did look like that kid. 

Bucky was going to have to dig around now and see if they were the same person because if he didn’t, and Steve was that kid he’d been in love with then Natasha had probably known since the day she’d gotten Bucky drunk enough to whine about how much he’d been in love with him and how he’d missed his chance because one day the boy had up and disappeared and Bucky had never seen him again. Which also meant she’d set this whole fucking thing up and he was going to have to kill her. 

He couldn’t just ask Steve if he’d been that tiny kid. Not without giving him a reason and he really didn’t want to tell his boss that he’d practically been in love with him since high school. Not when they barely knew each other now and had never spoken back then.

“Bucky? You okay?” He blinked when Steve waved a hand in front of his eyes then shook his head.

“Huh?”

“You spaced out for a minute.”

“Yeah. I’m sorry. What were you saying?” He had been saying something right? God, he hoped so. Otherwise Steve was going to think he was even crazier than what he probably already did.

“It’s okay. I was just saying that the twins are going to do the dishes after dinner and no more games this evening.” That seemed reasonable.

“Okay.”

“And they have something to say to you.”

“They do?”

Steve nodded with a small smile and Bucky turned to the table to look at the twins.

“We’re sorry you had to see us act like demon spawn.” They spoke at the same time, once again reminding him of the twins from The Shining, and he nodded not knowing quite what to say.

“It’s okay. Just don’t let it happen again.” He softened the words with a wink and they giggled. Steve even managed a quiet chuckle so Bucky figured he was in the clear.

“All right. I’m going to get back to work. You guys be good for Mr. Barnes yeah?”

“Yes, Daddy,” the Shining twins spoke again and Bucky wondered if they practiced it or if it was something all twins did, like the secret language thing.

“I’ll see you for dinner.”

Bucky and the twins nodded, watching silently as Steve walked out of the kitchen and made his way back up the stairs.

“So,” Bucky said after a moment. “What do you heathens want for dinner tonight?”

***

Steve walked into his office and fell into his desk chair with a sigh. He should have warned Bucky about the twins getting into fights sometimes, but honestly, siblings fought and even if Bucky didn’t have any he’d watched kids before so he probably knew. Granted most ten year olds hadn’t been taught basic self-defense by their paranoid families. It had been Natasha’s idea to teach them, Steve hadn’t wanted them to learn at first, but after Natasha reminded him of what she did and what he used to do he had figured a little bit was okay.

He hadn’t anticipated the twins using it on each other when they got into arguments though. He probably should have. His Ma would have warned him about it had she still been alive. He wished more often than not that she’d gotten to live and see him become the man he had instead of the little troublemaker he had been before she died. He wished she’d gotten to see her grandbabies too. She’d have straightened them out right quick after seeing or hearing about the fight. He kind of wished he’d seen it himself even though he would have had to break it up before they hurt each other beyond bruised pride and slug slime.

He huffed with a grin and then turned back to his laptop. He needed to finish this next read-through before dinner. Honestly it could wait until later, but he also wanted to keep his mind off of Bucky and the way the brunette had been staring at him down in the kitchen. Half like he was trying to figure something out by pinning him to a board and dissecting him and half like he wanted to pin him to the bed and tear his clothes off. After the way Bucky had treated him since starting the last bit was highly unlikely no matter how Steve felt about him. Bucky hated his guts for whatever reason so Steve began to think that he’d imagined that look. Or projected his own thoughts onto it. Buck had probably just been watching him to see how he dealt with the twins getting into a fight.

How the hell had he fallen in love with someone like Bucky Barnes? He barely knew him. Really he only knew what Natasha had told him which was very little, but watching him with the twins had planted to that stupid little seed in his heart that had sprouted into a giant fucking oak tree. And how the hell had he not noticed until now?

“Christ. Just get to work, Rogers. You can deal with that revelation later.”

He wanted to put his music on to distract himself from the entire mess, but couldn’t this time around because he wanted to listen for the twins to make sure they were being good for Bucky. He doubted there’d be any more problems from them, not this soon at least, but he wanted to listen for them just to be on the safe side. He knew his demon spawn had tempers that rivaled his and Natasha’s. Though they were a little closer to his. Natasha was more the wait you out until you least expect it type. He was more the crashing through walls and doors to chase your ass down type. He’d gotten his ass beat all through school because of it. Of course he’d been less than half the size he was now at the time. If he’d been this size in high school he could have taken the whole damn football team. The jerks on the baseball team too. Fuckers. Still, in the end none of them mattered. Maybe that was a tiny lie. He’d run into a couple of them during his time in the Army and none of them had recognized him as the scrawny gay kid they’d all beaten up and he’d taken pleasure in running them ragged as their CO. So he may have been a vindictive little shit, but still, after what they’d put him through they deserved it. 

“Work, damn it.” He needed to stop daydreaming so fucking much. He might actually get done at some point that way.

***

Bucky sat the bowl of salad on the table next to the pasta he’d cooked then looked toward his tiny helpers and watched as they set the plates and silverware on the table. He nodded when they looked up at him for approval then grinned.

“Go get your daddy. Tell him dinner’s ready.”

“Are you gonna stay,” Alexi asked quietly.

Bucky sighed. He should. They had been wanting him to stay for dinner, but he couldn’t. He didn’t want to fall further into this mess with Steve than he already was. Besides, he had to go home and start poking around to see if Steve was the kid from school he’d been head over heels for and too chicken shit to do anything about. Not that he’d even be able to do anything about it now, but still. It wouldn’t hurt to check, right?

“Not tonight, kiddo. Maybe tomorrow, yeah?”

“Okay.”

He watched the twins run out of the kitchen and shook his head with a smile then turned to the oven and pulled the garlic bread out and piled the slices on another plate to sit on the table. He grabbed the cold pitcher of lemon water from the fridge and sat it and the plate of garlic bread on the table then hightailed it to the front door so he could escape before Steve could come down and ask him to stay for dinner like he usually did. One day Bucky was going to run out of excuses to give him, but this wasn’t that day. He hoped that day didn’t come for a while actually. There was too much shit he needed to sort through. Too many feelings he shouldn’t have for a man he barely knew and had been nothing but a dick to since day one. He wanted to talk to someone about it, but the only person he had to talk to was Natasha and she’d just make fun of him or tell him to let it go, which wasn’t that easy or he’d be done with it already, so he was on his own this time.

He heard the twins rambling about him being able to play the piano and looked toward the stairs to see them traipsing down them with Steve following after and listening attentively. Not like some parents that just pretended to listen, but actually listening. He had a glint in his eyes that made Bucky worry slightly, but what could be so bad about it when he was just listening to the twins ramble about finding a place where Bucky could give them piano lessons?

“You’re not staying,” Steve murmured as the twins ran into the kitchen. Bucky shook his head.

“Can’t. Have some stuff to take care of at home.”

“Okay.”

“Yeah. It’s…” I’m just trying to figure out if you’re the first boy I’d ever fallen in love with or if it’s just my brain trying to give me an acceptable reason for liking you so fucking much without a good damn reason except for how I can tell how much you love your kids and you’re gorgeous and you have your shit together. Fucking unicorn. “I gotta go.” 

He turned and let himself out of the house, closing the door quietly behind him, without waiting for Steve to tell him goodbye like he usually did. Well, that wasn’t completely terrible. It also wasn’t as asshole-y as he usually was. He wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or not


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Phew! Y'all get 10k+ this chapter.
> 
> A lot of work went into this chapter from both myself and my amazing beta. Thank you! Let me tell you, this was a mess and a half when she got it.
> 
> She can be found @evanseb on tumblr 
> 
> And I can be found @lilyinthesnow on tumblr as well. 
> 
> Come flail about Sebastian Stan with us!
> 
> Also note the final chapter number has been updated. We're finally getting somewhere! Maybe.

Bucky went to the attic as soon as he got back to Natasha’s house, barely taking time to notice that she was gone again. He had to hunt down his stupid high school yearbook from junior year and see if Steve actually was the tiny blonde he’d been in love with back then. If he was, then Natasha had some explaining to do and Bucky had a job to quit. Well, he couldn’t quit because Natasha would jump his ass for it and a pissed off Natasha wasn’t a good thing for anyone, but he’d want to quit. As it was, he only had a few weeks left. He could make it that long. Probably. Maybe. It was kind of iffy.

He shook his head and dug through four boxes before finally finding the stupid yearbook. Honestly he was surprised he had even kept the thing this long. Granted it had been packed away for a decade or so, but still. He sat cross-legged on the dusty floor and flipped through until he found the horrible picture day photos. He’d always hated getting his picture taken for them. And God, those stupid backgrounds they always used. The navy blue one with what looked like a shitty laser light show. The lighter blue with wonky darker blue spots all over it that looked like someone had attacked it with a sponge. The emerald green that was identical except for the color. Horrible choices all of them.

He grimaced at the clothes and hair styles as he flipped through pages to get to see if the twink he’d fallen for had been Steve. He wasn’t quite brave enough to head straight to the R’s. He was more afraid to find out that Steve was that kid than finding out that he wasn’t. If he wasn’t then it was fine. Perfect even. But if he was? He didn’t know what to think about that. It wasn’t as if all those feelings would come rushing back just because Steve happened to be his first love even if he hadn’t known it at the time. No, Bucky had plenty of feelings about Steve all on his own without knowing if he’d been the tiny blonde.

He nearly fumbled the book. Holy fuck. No. Surely not. He was not in love with Art Stripper Steve. Couldn’t possibly be. There was nothing for it. He didn’t know him. Not really. He knew he was gorgeous and extremely talented with his artwork. He loved his children and seemed to have an endless supply of patience. Maybe he especially had patience with Bucky because anyone else would have fired his ass by now. He knew he’d been in the Army and had worked with SHIELD before becoming an Art History professor. None of that was enough to fall in love with. Was it? Jesus. He was fucked, wasn’t he? Either way it went. The next three weeks or so couldn’t end fast enough. He was going to wind up rejoining SHIELD full time even if he didn’t really want to. Just to try to get Rogers out of his head.

He sighed heavily, already tired of the job he didn’t even have yet and looked at the pictures again, moving closer and closer to the R’s. So far the kid hadn’t shown up yet. The kid had disappeared from school, but hopefully he’d still be in the yearbook if his picture had been taken in time. Bucky couldn’t remember the exact time frame.

He finally reached the R’s and there he was. The tiny blonde with big blue eyes and eyelashes that fanned across his cheeks when he blinked. The tiny blonde that had had a busted nose or black eye more often than not. The one that had decked Bucky when he’d rescued him from that douchebag that had been beating him up. Steve fucking Rogers. He was going to fucking kill Natasha. Or die trying. Die trying was the most likely end game for this situation, but either way he wouldn’t have to worry about Steve Rogers.

“Shit.” He pulled his mobile from his pocket, snapped a picture of Steve’s yearbook photo and then texted it to Natasha with a short but sweet message. _I hate you._ She replied a minute later with the crying/laughing emoji.

He slipped his phone back into his pocket then slammed the book shut and shoved it back in the box. He wasn’t going to even attempt to deal with this little revelation right now. Nope. Not gonna happen. He was going to go back downstairs, drink a couple beers, and eat some of his coffee-flavored M&Ms and then go the fuck to bed where he’d hopefully wake up and this would all be a fucked up dream. Because no way in hell was he ever going to deal with this. He’d done the ‘in love and pining for something that would never happen’ thing. He wasn’t a fan and he wasn’t going to do it again. Granted high school had been a long time ago and he’d grown up a lot since then, but even so he absolutely refused to deal with it.

***

“Daddy, can we have a piano since Mr. Bucky knows how to play?”

Steve hummed in thought as the twins stared up at him where they waited for the bus to pick them up. It wouldn’t hurt anything to look around. He knew pianos could be expensive, but maybe he could find one decently priced or at least find somewhere that had one they could use a couple hours a week.

“I’ll look into it.” The twins jumped around excitedly and he sighed. “I don’t make any promises. They can be expensive.”

“Okay, Daddy.”

They got on the bus moments later and he walked back to the house for his car and then made his way to work. He managed to push Bucky and the piano from his mind at least until lunch time where he’d used his free hour looking up pianos, new and used, and absolutely refusing to imagine what Bucky’s fingers would look like dancing across the keys. Refused to wonder what songs his metal fingers add to the music as they hit the keys. Refused to wonder if his face would look pensive or peaceful. Refused to wonder if he would lose himself in the music and not be at all aware of his surroundings. He refused to imagine exactly where he’d put the piano if he bought one; the living room, in front of the west facing window so the sunset would shine on Bucky while he played. Nope, he hadn’t imagined any such thing.

Steve already wanted to sketch him sitting at a fucking piano. But he wasn’t imagining what it would look like.

He was picturing his children sitting on the bench next to Bucky while he patiently taught them how to play with a smile on his face. That stupidly attractive smile that he only gave the twins. The one Steve wanted directed at himself at least once. He wanted to see his twins excited about learning something new. He wanted to see their happy smiles. Hear their excited chatter and ecstatic laughter. He tried not to think about the fact that learning to play the piano was a long term goal and that meant more time around Bucky, even if it got cut down to an hour or two a week. He’d pay him for the lessons of course, but during the summer when Steve didn’t have work to keep him busy? Being around Bucky that much more would surely kill him.

He sighed looking back to his laptop as he scrolled through posts of pianos for sell. He didn’t want to go crazy spending money on one because who knew if the twins would actually like playing; though he figured Bucky would encourage them to play even if they weren’t sure about it at first. So he’d find something cheap enough that it wouldn’t bankrupt him if they didn’t like it and he could donate it somewhere or resell it. Probably he should just find someone to give the twins piano lessons, but they already knew and loved Bucky and since he could play and was working for Steve already? Yeah, Steve was going to buy a fucking piano for his heathens.

He came across an old piano being sold by a church and figured it would be good enough for now. If the twins got into piano playing more than he thought they would he could get them something better later on. The listing said it was a 1976 Kimball upright, whatever that meant, and that it was slightly out of tune, but in great condition otherwise. It looked okay from the pictures, but what did he know? Besides, it was only $250. And the money was going to a church so it’d help them out too. He could get someone to come out and tune it for him since he didn’t know the first thing about music. Or maybe Bucky could tune it since he did.

He made the call and arranged to meet them early enough that he could get home on time if he left work early. And hopefully the piano could be delivered before the twins got home from school. He canceled his last class of the day since they weren’t doing anything but discussing the last chapter of their textbooks. They could make it up the next day and not be terribly behind on anything. He’d practically thrown out the last of his syllabus anyway and was letting his students do pretty much whatever they wanted within reason. As long as they got their final papers in he honestly didn’t care what they did. Something he’d never done before. And it was all Bucky’s fault.

***

“I’m going to kill you.” Bucky’d find a way to do it. No matter how long it took, he’d find a way to kill Natasha. She might be more practiced than he was since she’d been working since birth practically, but he’d find a way. He was nothing if not resourceful. When she only laughed at him he growled and flopped back onto the couch.

“Why are you freaking out about this?”

“You know why.”

“It doesn’t change anything. So you had a crush on him in high school, big deal.” The line crackled and he figured she was in an elevator. He knew he shouldn’t have been calling her at work, but he’d been impatient and panicking and he didn’t have anyone else to call. And he wanted to bitch her out for setting this whole thing up. As far as he knew she was the one that had convinced Rogers he needed a nanny for his babies anyway. Just so she could get him the job. “He’s just someone you used to know.”

“Rogers did not look like this in high school.”

“That’s what the big deal is?”

“No! There’s no deal. Especially not a big deal. Nothing can happen anyway. He fuckin’ hates me if you don’t recall. I’m being stupid. It’s just a shock to find out that that little punk I used to be in love with in high school turned into this giant beefy blonde that just happens to be my boss.”

“What are you going to do about it?”

“Nothing. Pretend it’s it not real. Pretend I never realized it and go on with my life.”

“You’ve always been good at hiding.”

“I’m not hiding,” he murmured, staring at the clock that told him it was almost time to leave for work.

“You’re hiding.” He heard a muffled conversation in the background and sighed. “I have to go. I’ll be back in a week or so and then you and I will talk about this. Okay?”

“There’s nothing to talk about.” Except for how badly he wanted to kill her right now. “Be safe.”

“I always am.” She hung up on him before he could laugh at her and he sighed then dropped his phone beside him on the couch.

What the hell was he doing? It was a mistake to call out Natasha on her meddling, not that he had much proof of it, if any proof at all. He’d known it before he had called her, but he’d been having a minor panic attack and sometimes listening to Natasha’s calm, cool, and collected voice was the only thing that could bring him out of it.

At least he hadn’t been panicked enough to tell her that he was in love with Steve all over again for entirely different reasons than he’d had in high school. That would’ve made the call to her even worse.

He was going to pretend like he told her he would. He’d pretend that he’d never realized who Steve was. Pretend nothing was wrong and go on with his life. Nothing about this was real or could be real. Pretend he wasn’t in love with Art Stripper Unicorn Steve. He absolutely refused to admit anything to anyone that wasn’t himself and even though he’d already realized it, he hadn’t actually admitted it to himself so he was going to bury that shit as deep as he could. He refused to be in love with someone who was a relative stranger. Absolutely fucking refused.

It lasted all of the hour it had taken him to get to Steve’s house. An old pickup was pulling out of the driveway, Steve’s car was pulled up into a garage that Bucky had never seen open, nor the car parked in it, and Bucky could hear the twins screaming. His heart raced until he realized it was excited screams and not the sounds of being murdered, and the rush of adrenaline helped him shove that stupid spark where it belonged. Inside a twelve inch steel-walled box, shoved in another box full of concrete, wrapped in chains, and then tossed in the ocean. Love? What love?

He stepped onto the porch and knocked on the doorjamb since Steve had apparently left the damn thing hanging open, then peeked around the door to see the twins screeching and apparently practicing for a mosh pit what with the way they were jumping around and flailing. They looked like they’d do well at one. Though he highly doubted their daddy would let them anywhere near a mosh pit, not with him being as protective of them as he was. He finally stepped inside and waved at Steve since the twins were busy moshing.

The way Steve’s eyes lit up when he spotted Bucky blasted through his stupid steel and concrete reinforced box and his heart stuttered in his chest at the feel of it. Christ he was so fucked. So very fucked. He couldn’t help but superimpose Tiny Steve over Art Stripper Steve just for a second, just enough to settle it even more that they were one and the same, before Art Stripper Steve was just himself again. It was different, what Bucky felt for him now, he realized. Back in school it had been infatuation, teenage lust, and puppy love. This? The feeling he had while Steve was smiling at him like the sun shone from his ass, this was _love_. And since when the fuck did Steve smile at him like that any-fucking-way? He only hoped he didn’t have that same dopey smile on his own face and tried to school his expression into something he hoped looked neutral and not like he was fucking having a stroke.

“Bucky, hey!”

“Uh, hi?”

“I did something.”

“Congratulations?”  The fuck was Rogers going on about? Bucky did things. He did lots of things. Some things. A few things. No one ever threw him a party over it. What’d Steve want? A cookie? Brownie points? An actual brownie?

“Yeah, no.” Steve grinned waving Bucky further into the house and Bucky turned to close the door to give himself a minute to breathe. That stupid smile was burned into his fucking corneas or something because it was still the only thing he could see. “Come here. I got it for the twins.”

Bucky turned back to Steve and followed him into the living room to see an old piano against one wall. An old piano that looked a hell of a lot like the one he’d learned to play on. Right down to the horrible 1970’s gold velvet covered bench. He half thought that if he lifted the lid that covered the keys and the lid on the bench he’d see JBB carved into it. He wanted to check. He didn’t want to check. Didn’t want another revelation this fucking soon after realizing he was head over heels in love with a man he barely knew. Oh, but he wanted to know if that was the piano he had learned to play on. If it was, what kind of fucking coincidence would it be that Steve had bought the old Kimball piano? Was it another Natasha meddling thing? Or just that much of a coincidence?

“You bought a piano.” The sun would be shining on it where it was sitting and Bucky was going to have to change that if Steve didn’t want the wood to dry out. Did Steve even know how to care for a piano? Did he know he’d have to wipe it down with Old English oil once a week? But only the yellow kind because the red kind would melt the finish. Bucky doubted he knew.

“Yeah. I wasn’t planning on it and probably I should have asked you about it first, but the twins asked for one and this was cheap so I got it.”

“All the way from the 70’s huh?”

Steve chuckled, “Yeah. The lady at the church said it was slightly out of tune. I thought maybe you’d know how to fix it? Or if not I can get someone to come out and do it.”

“Yeah…I don’t know how to tune a piano. I just play them.” He looked away from Steve when he heard a horrendous clanging and saw that the twins had uncovered the keys and were now smashing them at random. “I hope you know what you’re getting yourself into.”

“I’ll live.” He pulled a packet from his pocket and showed Bucky a pair of fluorescent orange ear plugs.

“Some faith you have,” Bucky said with a small grin. Yeah, he didn’t have much faith at first either, but he knew damn good and well that even if the twins missed every note he and Steve would still be there cheering them on.

Steve snorted out a laugh. “So since I maybe, possibly, did something without thinking, do you think you can teach them to play? It’s just they already know you and everything. And you did say you knew how. It’d only be a couple days a week.  I can pay you for the lessons.”

“Don’t worry about paying me for the lessons. I’ll already be here.” Though he didn’t know how much the twins would get out of only a few weeks’ worth of lessons.

“Only for a few more weeks. But after, if you still want to teach them I’ll pay you for the lessons.”

“Oh. Yeah. I uh...” No. No damn it. He couldn't. He was going to rejoin S.H.I.E.L.D. on a permanent basis. Full time. No leave. Leaving the country, maybe. Moving to Oklahoma to search for Bigfoot in the mountains around Talihina and Honobia. Technically he’d already done that last bit. It hadn’t been the falling in cow shit face-first mission, though. Maybe Tahlequah had Bigfoot issues too. And he’d probably jump at the chance to go back again just to get away from Steve and those stupid blue eyes that were watching him so closely right now. “Sure. That’d be fine.” It would not be fine! Spending more time around Steve would definitely not be fine.

“Thanks Buck.”

“It’s not a problem.” It was definitely a problem. He turned back to the twins and the piano and walked away from his problem. “That’s not how you play the piano.” Bucky nudged them aside then sat down and ran the scales. He winced afterward looking over his shoulder at their father.

“A little out of tune, my ass.”

“It’s not a big deal. I’ll get someone to come out.”

“Yeah, okay.” Bucky had to get rid of him. “Get to work, Rogers. The twins and I have homework and we can’t do it if you’re hovering.” Steve huffed and rolled his eyes, but made his way upstairs.

“Are you going to teach us how to play after Daddy gets the piano fixed?” Alexa asked. Bucky nodded.

“Yeah. Yeah I am. Go get your homework out.” The twins scrambled away from the piano and he folded out the cover for the keys, not looking to see if it was the same piano from all those years ago. He had too much going on to worry about it right at that moment.

***

It only took a day for Steve to find someone to come out and tune the piano. Thankfully the woman had shown up while Bucky was there with the kids so he could make sure it sounded right. Or as right as the old piano could get. Either way, as long as it was close to right and the twins enjoyed it, it didn’t particularly matter.

Steve made sure to tell them that they couldn’t practice until homework was done and done correctly which Bucky had told him was a given. The first song Bucky started them out on was Chopsticks. Steve hated it, but the twins thought it was funny. After that, Bucky asked them if they’d ever seen a movie called Big, which they hadn’t but Steve had, and Steve shook his head with a smile when Bucky started playing Heart and Soul. When Steve had been a kid he’d wanted to go to F.A.O. and play on the 16 feet long piano. He’d never gotten to go. Maybe he’d take the twins someday.

He couldn’t exactly bring it up though. He was supposed to be working. Supposed to have been locked in his office with his ear plugs in and working to make up for lost time. Instead he was sat on the steps watching Bucky teach the twins little jingles. Steve knew they’d get to the actual notes soon. Bucky had given him the name of a couple lesson books for them to start out with and Steve had ordered them, but they weren’t due in for another few days so jingles and whatever else came to Bucky’s mind would have to work for now. The twins would love it either way.

Steve looked down at his sketchpad and shaded in the line of Bucky’s jaw and then the creases around his eyes when he smiled. Bucky and the twins looked even better than Steve had imagined they would. The sunlight highlighted reddish streaks in Bucky’s dark hair. The twins’ copper hair shone like fire. All three of them had huge smiles on their faces, even when one of the twins missed a note. It was beautiful. Perfect. Steve would’ve been content to sit there all afternoon and watch them but he didn’t want to get caught.

He stood and made his way up to his office, expertly dodging the creaky steps. When he got inside he closed the door all but a crack and sat at his desk. He looked over the sketch, shading in a few more lines then tapped his lip with his pencil as he contemplated what flower to use on this one. Aster for contentment, definitely. His eyes strayed to their smiles as he worked in the Aster and he knew the next flower would be a yellow tulip for sunshine in your smile. Steve also, slightly guiltily and more than a little bit desperately, drew a vase holding a yellow acacia and put it on the top of the piano right in front of Bucky. It meant secret love, and that’s all Steve could ever feel for Bucky. He knew it wouldn’t be reciprocated if he did come out with it, so it would stay secret.

As long as he didn’t do anything stupid.

Like open his mouth. Or speak. Or breathe. Or gaze adoringly from his hiding spot on the stairs or in the doorway of the kitchen and get busted. Like he almost did four times in the next few days. By the time Thursday rolled around, Steve had made several more sketches, feeling more and more pitiful with each one. His level of pining was reaching Epic Status and he was just about ready to throw in the damn towel and tell Bucky he loved him just to get it out there so he could deal with his stupid heart. But then Bucky would quit, Natasha would never ever let it go, and he’d have to find a new nanny. Maybe he’d ask Natasha to find someone more like Mrs. Doubtfire and less like Bucky Barnes.

The only one that would be proud of him for putting it out in the open would be Sam. What did a counselor know about this kind of stuff anyway? Yeah, okay that wasn't fair to Sam, but still. And if he did say something he’d have to talk to the twins about it and he just wasn’t that confident in his parenting skills. How would they react to him being in love with their nanny? Sam thought it was hilarious. Natasha didn’t have a clue and that was only because he’d been avoiding her like the plague and giving her vague answers whenever she asked him how Bucky and the twins were doing. Everyone was fine. It was good. It worked out just like she said it would. But he couldn’t tell her she was right about something because she’d hold it over his head for the rest of his life.

Thursday evening he held Bucky back to ask him if he could watch the twins all day Friday because they’d be out of school due to a state teacher’s meeting and he’d forgotten to give him advance warning. Bucky had only looked at him like he was crazy, not unusual, and then said yes because apparently Steve’s twins were more on top of things than he was at this point. So Bucky would be there before he left in the morning and he and the twins would be running around unsupervised. Which was good. Definitely good. Perfect even. Steve didn’t need to be there every second that Bucky was. He could even go on a date if he wanted.

He didn’t want. But he could’ve done something besides rush home as soon as school let out to make sure his soulless ginger demon babies were okay and that Bucky was right there where he was supposed to be. Which was at work. Working. He was working. Steve hadn’t expected him to greet him at the door with a sunshine bright smile, okay? He hadn’t even fantasized about it. Not even a little bit. He didn’t. Bucky was his employee after all and it just wasn’t right to even think about how gorgeous Bucky would look with that smile and those sparkling eyes directed at Steve for once.

He definitely had not opened his mouth when Bucky was fixing to walk out the door after he’d finished cooking the dinner he wouldn’t stay to eat no matter how many times Steve and the twins invited him. And he had definitely not asked him if he wanted to stay for a beer and relax a little bit before he went home. Nope. Never fucking happened. Not that he’d admit to anyone. Except maybe Sam because Steve was fixing to have a fucking nervous breakdown. Possibly even worse than the one he had when he realized he was less equipped for twins than he previously thought. Those first two years had been brutal. But this? This was something he had no clue how to handle, but he thought maybe another talk with Sam was sounding pretty good right now.

He at least needed to tell Sam that he’d asked Bucky about staying for a beer, even if it was purely accidental, and about the look Bucky had given him when he had asked. The asking thing would never ever happen again by the way, because the look Bucky had leveled him with had gone right to whatever parts of his brain controlled fear and confusion. Steve had never been more confused or more terrified at a look. At least not from anyone that wasn’t Natasha. Bucky had looked half furious and half disgusted that Steve had even asked. Steve felt like tiny him from high school all over again. It wasn’t fun.

He knew Bucky had probably been exhausted from watching the twins all day instead of just a few hours and he’d just wanted to offer him a beer to help him relax. He’d made a mistake apparently and felt like he should have apologized even though he wasn’t sure he’d done anything wrong and he was a little bit pissed off about it too. Most bosses probably didn’t offer their employees alcohol, but Bucky had been off the clock and the twins had already been put to bed. Apparently it was a huge infraction to have even asked. Steve didn’t even fucking know anymore. But he was definitely going to keep pretending that he had not asked Bucky anything about staying for a beer. Ever. Nothing of the sort had ever happened.

When Monday rolled around he just left another sketch with a post-it on it, apologizing for what was likely no reason, on the kitchen table. He avoided Bucky. Bucky avoided him except to say thank you for the sketch. And the three that he’d left after that. And the couple the time after that. He didn’t know what possessed him, but Steve made copies of all of the sketches he’d done up until the piano sketch, except for the one where Bucky had been dancing in the kitchen and the caricature of himself, and gave most of the originals to Bucky. There were a couple more left, but he hadn’t copied them yet. Hopefully Bucky didn’t think he was a creepy stalker, though he probably would have if Steve had given him the sketch of him dancing. Actually, that's probably why Bucky was avoiding him now. He just really fucking hoped that Bucky didn’t notice the damn flowers or know what they were or what they meant. He’d given Bucky an entire fucking stack of love notes. Jesus. What had he done?

***

He finally gave in to his urge to beg Sam for help and rushed into his office, yelling at his best friend. “Sam! Sam, I need you to come home with me. I seriously need you.”

Sam looked up in confusion for a second, why the hell was Steve yelling like that? and then sighed heavily. He already knew what this was about. Who this was about he should say. Damn it. He’d hoped Steve would get this straightened out already. He knew he wouldn’t talk to his nanny though. He’d known that the last time he had talked to Steve, but he’d been hoping. So much for that.

“Sam. Please. Just come home with me today. I need you.”

“But, Steve! This is so sudden. What would the kids say about having a new daddy?”

Steve glared at him, all righteous indignation, and Sam bit back a laugh.

“I'm serious!” Steve fell into the chair across from Sam's desk and groaned pitifully, tossing his head back against the hard plastic. “I need help.”

“What do I need to go home with you for?”

“I need you to keep me from beating the shit out of and/or fucking my nanny.”

Sam raised surprised eyebrows at Steve's confession. Then he grinned. He was glad Steve finally wanted to talk about it, again, but he wasn’t prepared to talk about it in his office. Not where any of the faculty or students might hear.

“This conversation requires beer and nachos. I'll follow you home, meet the nanny, and then we're going to the bar.”

“Okay. Yeah, okay. Thanks Sam. Really.”

“Just how hot is this nanny, Steve?” Sam already knew, he’d seen the sketches after all, but he wanted to hear Steve say it.

Steve sighed a little wistfully and dropped his hands from his face. “So fucking gorgeous.”

“Listen here, Professor. You're an artist. Have been your entire life and the only description you can give is the nanny is gorgeous. Where are your colors, Steve? I bet his skin is like alabaster and his eyes remind you of cornflowers. His lips are crimson and his hair is like polished mahogany.”

“Ugh. I hate you.”

***

Bucky got to Steve’s house a little earlier than usual because he’d been lost in his head over all of the sketches Steve had given him the past few days. When he had finally managed to tear himself away from them he rushed through getting ready and had barely remembered to lock up on his way out.

They were all so amazing with Steve’s attention to detail. Detail that still made Bucky slightly paranoid, but they were beautiful and each had Steve’s silly little flower signature, and Bucky might have actually been planning on having them all matted and framed after his job was over.

He heard the twins yelling for their ‘Uncle Sam’ as he knocked on the door. Steve let him in with a tight smile, waving him toward the living room where Bucky promptly tried his best not to act jealous at the way the twins were screaming for the cute black guy that they were jumping on. Well, he tried not to laugh too, because ‘Uncle Sam’ was fucking hysterical, but mostly he was jealous because he’d never seen Steve with anyone else. And was this guy an uncle as in their father’s best friend or was this guy like an ‘uncle’ that their father was dating and had never mentioned to Bucky before even though he had no reason to and definitely didn’t owe Bucky any fucking explanation at all about bringing another man home? And if he was dating Sam, then why the hell hadn’t he been here this whole time taking care of the heathens while Steve was working in his office? Why had Steve even needed a fucking nanny when he had Sam? Maybe Sam worked out of town though. Either way it didn’t matter because they could and would never be Steve and Bucky. They were Steve and the nanny. Boss and employee. That’s all they could ever and would ever be.

“Hey Buck, do you mind watching the kids a little later than usual tonight? Sam and I are gonna go grab a couple of beers.”

Bucky blinked at Steve then at Sam, barely suppressing a sneer when Sam grinned at him. Ok, that grin was adorable, but still. Why the hell was Steve going out on a weeknight, a school night even, and leaving Bucky to handle everything, probably including bedtime since Steve was asking if he’d stay a little while longer than usual? Who had drinks on a school night? Boyfriends who’d been apart too long? Boyfriends who didn’t get to see each other that often so they were taking any minute they could to be together? What the hell was going on?

Not that it mattered. It totally didn’t matter to Bucky what or who Steve did in his spare time. Did not matter in the least. So why did his heart feel like it was breaking? The stupid fucking thing was getting him screwed over wasn’t it? He’d tried his damnedest not to get close to Steve and he’d done it anyway even without managing to actually have a real conversation with him. It pissed Bucky off. He’d been trying so hard. He was absolutely, in no way whatsoever in love with Steve. From here on out he was pretending none of the last few weeks had happened. He was starting over today. Maybe. Possibly, but first he needed to get rid of Steve because those fucking puppy eyes were making it harder to think. And mostly he needed to get rid of Sam.

“You’re a grown man, Rogers. You don’t need my permission to go out on a date.”

Rogers choked on his own spit apparently and coughed while his face flushed crimson. Sam only smirked and Bucky wanted to punch that smirk right off his smug fucking face while Rogers sputtered. “What? No! It’s not…”

Bucky shook his head and went into the kitchen so he could pretend his heart wasn’t fucking breaking for no damn reason. “Just go, Steve,” he called over his shoulder as he walked. “The twins and I will be perfectly fine without you. We always are.” And holy shit he sounded like a neglected spouse. What the hell, brain? What the hell just happened to his brain to mouth filter? Wow. Was he really that fucking jealous and petty? Apparently so. What a day to learn new things about himself. Awesome. Stupid fucking Steve. Stupid fucking adorable Sam. So not fucking fair.

Less than five minutes of stewing in seething jealousy later, the twins came into the kitchen and Bucky heard Steve and his boyfriend leaving. He was tempted to ask the twins about Sam, so very fucking tempted, but he’d never stoop so low. If Steve wanted him to know about Sam he’d have said something about him before. It’s not like Steve knew he’d surprised Bucky with him. Not like Steve even had a reason to suspect that Bucky had fallen in love with him like a fucking dumbass. Steve was his boss. It couldn’t happen. Wouldn’t happen. Steve could keep Sam for all Bucky cared and when Steve was finished with work and no longer needed him, Bucky was heading straight for SHIELD and getting his job back. Fuck it. He didn’t have anything keeping him here and eventually Natasha was going to get tired of him and ask him to move out anyway. At least with SHIELD he’d have enough money to actually do that when the time came.

“Mr. Bucky?”

“Yeah, sweetpea?”

“Are you okay? You look angry.”

Bucky took a deep breath to steady himself then shook his head and gave Alexa a half-hearted smile. “No, I’m okay. It’s kind of been a bad day today.”

“We can call Auntie Tasha and she’ll come watch us if you need to go home,” Lexi offered. Bucky would’ve sobbed if it wouldn’t have scared them. God he adored them so fucking much.

“No. It’s okay. I’m okay. Natasha is gone for work anyway. She won’t be home for a couple more days. I’m ok. I promise.” He wasn’t really, but maybe if he told himself he was enough it might actually come true. “Let’s do your school work and then we’ll play the piano and figure out what to order for dinner.”

“We already ordered in this week.”

“Your daddy ain’t here.” He was probably going to be eating dinner with Sam anyways. “And we’re allowed to make these kinds of decisions on bad days. I am at least. Homework, please.”

***

Sam waited until they both finished their first beer before speaking. He’d been letting Steve stew in whatever the hell was going on in that stubborn blonde head of his while they drank, but Sam actually wanted to get home at some point, and if he didn’t get Steve to talk they’d sit there all evening in stony silence.

“I get why you want to fuck him.” Steve glared at Sam who raised his hands in surrender. “Dudes hot, just sayin’. So why do you want to kick his ass?” Sam was going to get Steve to admit he was in love with the nanny if it was the last thing he did. Even if it meant going over the same conversation they had in Steve’s classroom. Steve was probably pissed off enough that he’d roll with the conversation anyway.

“He's a total dick,” Steve finally murmured.

“Then why is he watching your kids?”

“He's not to them. I trust him with their lives. I just don't trust him with mine. He's so good with them Sam. He's kind, and gentle, and caring, and he helps them with so much. They do their homework and eat dinner and I hear them all laughing from my office. I looked out the window yesterday when I heard them outside. He was chasing them through the yard and swinging them on the swings and playing in the play house. I mean, they do it all the time. It was just...he really cares about them, Sam. They're not just a job to him.”

“Why don't you trust him with you?”

“Because he's a douchebag. He's rude, and inconsiderate, he barely speaks to me and when he does it's something snarky or smartassed. He's always rude to me actually. I can't pin my finger on it, you know? He's just such an asshole! Okay, like last week: the kids didn't have school Friday so I needed him to watch them all day.”

“Yeah.”

“Okay, well I asked him if he'd like to stay for a beer, relax a little before he went home, right? I mean the kids were in bed already and it was just a beer.”

“What did he say?”

“He just gave me this weird look, like why would he ever want to drink a beer with me, said ‘nope’ and just walked out the door. And you saw how he was earlier.”

Sam nodded and tried not to smile. This would have been so much fun if it wasn’t quite so irritating. He saw the look Bucky had given him when Steve said they were going out for drinks. The little jealous glare he didn't bother to hide. The sneer on his lips when he told Steve that he was a grown man and didn't need his permission to get drinks with someone. Steve was fucking oblivious to it of course. Purely because he was Steve and so damned oblivious to people liking him anyway.

“You got it bad for him, Steve.”

“I know! I know, Sam,” he added quietly. “He’s so beautiful when he’s with the kids. You know? It’s just, whenever he looks at me it’s with disdain or something like it, but as soon as it’s just him and the kids he changes. His eyes light up and his whole body relaxes. He smiles at them and it’s like they’re his whole world. Even if it’s only for a few hours a day. He’s so sweet with them. I’ve never seen anyone else care about the twins like he does.”

“Except you.”

“Well, yeah. That’s a given. I’m their father.”

“He’s not though, Steve. In a couple weeks you’re going to be done with work and he’s going to be gone. Have you thought about that? Chances are you won’t see him again. Not unless you do something about it.”

“He’s their piano teacher too. What am I supposed to do? Walk up to a man that can’t stand me and tell him how stupidly I’ve fallen in love with him from afar? Because that always works out well. I don’t understand it, Sam. He’s an asshole to me. Has been since day one and we barely speak two words to each other the entire time he’s at the house. But I hear him talk to the kids and I watch them playing in the backyard and working in the garden and it’s just…I know about him. It’s not just because he’s the most beautiful man I’ve ever seen. I mean, Natasha told me some stuff. Not a lot. I’m fucking stupid Sam. This isn’t logical at all. Nothing about this is okay.”

“Who ever said love was logical?”

“It doesn’t matter anyway. He hates me.”

“Twenty bucks says you’re wrong. Watch him when you get back to your house. See what he does. I’m telling you the truth. The nanny is totally into you.”

“Even if he is, which he’s not, I still can’t have sex with my kids’ nanny. I can’t be in love with my kids’ nanny.”

“Lots of guys do it,” Sam grinned at the glare he got from the blonde. He knew Steve would never just have sex with his nanny. It would be a serious breach of his ethics and he’d see it as taking advantage of someone in his employ. “Look, if you’re not going to have a torrid love affair with your nanny there’s only one other option.”

“What’s that?”

“Fire him and then fuck his brains out.”

“Sam!”

The look of absolute shock and the crimson blush on Steve’s face had Sam cackling in laughter and failing to dodge the soggy cheese laden chip flung at his head.

***

Sam was still wiping at the dried nacho cheese in his hair when he pulled up at Steve’s to drop him off. “Please talk to him Steve. I’m telling you, right here, right now. That man is in love with you.”

“Don’t, Sam. Don’t get my hopes up.”

“I think you need your hopes up. Even for a little bit.”

“No. I can’t do anything even if he was. It’s not…It’s not right, Sam. I’d be taking advantage and I can’t do that to him. It’s just…it’s better off if I leave it alone. I just needed to get everything off my chest and even if I don’t tell him I love him, at least someone knows. Someone besides me.” Steve gave him a wobbly smile and Sam shoved the gearshift into park and dragged Steve into a tight hug.

“Too damn decent for your own good. I don’t like seeing you this way, Steve.”

“I know. I’m sorry.”

“Don’t. It’s not your fault. Things like this are never anyone’s fault. You can’t control who your heart wants.”

“It’d be so much easier. I wonder if it’s just how good he is with the kids that’s made me feel this way.”

Sam sighed heavily then pushed Steve back to meet his eyes. “Steve. I realize you’re naïve about some things, maybe especially this, because you’ve been in love exactly one time in your life before this, but if that were the case then Natasha or I could just as easily fit the bill. It’s not the way he is with the twins. Or not completely. How much or how little you know about him doesn’t matter. You see something in him that’s made your heart go ‘oh, he fits’ and now it wants that. Wants that little puzzle piece to snap into place. It might happen or it might not, but you’ll never get the chance to find out how well that puzzle piece fits if you don’t talk to him.”

Steve nodded then gave Sam another tight hug. “Thank you, Sam.”

“Any time, Steve. I mean it. Talk to your boy, okay? If it doesn’t work out we’ll get Natasha to watch the twins and you and I can go get shitfaced.”

Steve chuckled quietly then wiped his eyes and got out of the car with a small parting smile. “See you later.”

Sam watched Steve walk around the car and to the front door. It opened before he got to it, light spilling out into the grey of early evening. They hadn’t stayed gone as long as Steve thought they might, so they were early getting back. Bucky must have been waiting for them. How much seething and grumbling and pouting had Bucky done while Sam and Steve had been at the bar? Had he watched them, thinking they were going to be making out in the car? What had he thought about their lingering hug? Sam kind of wanted to sneak around and find out if Bucky said or did anything else that made him sound like a jealous and neglected spouse like he had before they’d gone. Idiot. If only Bucky could see the way Steve looked at him. Like he was his everything. They really needed to get their shit together.  Sam waited until Steve was inside then dictated a message to Natasha as he backed out of the driveway and headed toward home.

Sam didn’t speak with Natasha often, she scared him honestly, but he knew how much she cared about Steve. Like Steve, Sam had never heard of Bucky until now, but he knew Natasha kept everything so close to herself that he could have gone his entire life without ever having known Bucky existed if Steve hadn’t told him about the nanny.

“These boys need to get their shit together.”

***

“You’re early,” Bucky murmured as he let Steve into the house. He hadn’t been watching out the little glass window in the door. Or through the curtains. He hadn’t. He’d just been checking to see who had been idling in the driveway for so long and just happened to see Steve and Sam embrace. His heart had broken a little bit more and his blood had boiled just a tiny bit at the lingering hug. It had been one hell of a goodbye from what Bucky could tell. Or could have told if he’d been watching them closely. Which he hadn’t been.

“Yeah,” Steve nodded, staring at the floor. He didn’t want Bucky to see that he’d been crying like a fool. When Bucky stayed silent Steve realized he was waiting on an answer and cleared his throat as he shrugged his shoulders. “We didn’t stay as long as we thought we might.”

“Why were you crying?”

“I wasn’t. Jalapenos on the nachos.” He knew Bucky was smarter than that, but maybe he’d let it go. Steve wasn’t in the right mindset to admit anything except for how tired he was. “Are the twins in bed already?”

“Only just. Did he break up with you?” Bucky could have punched himself in the eye with his left hand. He hadn’t meant to ask, to avoid possibly rubbing salt into an open wound, but Steve looked like shit. His eyes were red rimmed and his shoulders were slumped. His usually carefully combed hair was in disarray. He looked like he’d gotten broken up with and a tiny, tiny, evil part of Bucky was glad if that was the case. Sam hadn’t been around at all in the weeks he’d been working for Steve, and if Sam wasn’t there for Steve the way he needed to be then Bucky was glad he was gone.

How the hell did Bucky think that Sam was Steve's boyfriend? Why would he think that? Did he not think that two men could just be friends? Did Steve and Sam look like they were that close? “That’s not.”

“My business, yeah I know. I’m sorry.” Bucky cut him off gently. “There’s leftover pizza in the fridge and one of those giant chocolate chip cookie things.”

“Cookie pizza.”

“Yeah.”

Steve met his eyes for the first time since walking in the door, for more than a fleeting second at least. He wanted to fall into Bucky’s arms and hold onto him tightly. Tell him he loved him and beg him not to go. He wanted to stare into those ice grey eyes and promise him the world if only he’d stay. He couldn’t do that though, because he knew Bucky hated him. It didn’t matter what Sam said. He was wrong. There was nothing about Bucky that even hinted at the fact that Bucky was in love with him or ever could be. It was a pipedream.

Bucky knew damn good and well that Steve had gotten broken up with. Why else would he look so pitiful? It made Bucky want to wrap his arms around the blonde and hold him tightly while he promised everything would be all right. That no one and nothing would hurt him ever again. That he loved him and he’d always be there for him if Steve would let him be. He couldn’t do that though. He couldn’t let himself get any closer than he already was. Steve disliked him a great deal, he hoped at least, and he had to keep that up so it would be easier to walk away once this was all over. He didn’t want to. Didn’t want to keep it up and didn’t want to walk away, but he had to. It was better that way. For all of them.

“Thank you Bucky,” Steve murmured, looking back at the floor. “For watching the twins and dinner. Everything.”

“I didn’t do it for you, Rogers.”

Steve nodded, not turning to look for once as Bucky walked out of the house. He felt like an idiot. He couldn’t keep doing this. This whole shitty situation was ridiculous. It was beyond ridiculous. He sighed heavily after he was sure Bucky was gone and then went through the house locking all the doors and checking the windows.

Bucky had cleaned up the kitchen again so he didn’t need to worry about cleaning anything. He opened the fridge and bypassed the pizza and cookie, reaching into the very back for a bottle of beer he never touched unless the kids were away or in bed already. He didn’t think drinking a beer in front of his children was wrong; he’d just never been comfortable with drinking in front of them. He had never been sure why.

He opened the beer and took a sip of it as he stared at the contents of his fridge. All of Bucky’s  little touches were glaringly obvious. The way he’d slowly rearranged the fridge to his liking. The way all the labels on the bottles of dressings or tubs of yoghurt were facing the front. The different types of drinks organized by type then by name. Little things he shouldn’t notice that Bucky had done, but he did. He was getting weepy over the damn fridge. He closed the door a little harder than he should have, wincing when the contents rattled and backed away from it slowly, looking around the rest of the kitchen.

He also noticed the way Bucky had subtly reorganized the kitchen. Changing the way the copper pots and pans hung on their hooks. Where Steve had just put them up at random, Bucky had hung them up in order from smallest to largest. He had reorganized the silverware drawer. Reorganized the cupboards. Rearranged all the food in the small pantry. Turned all the labels facing forward. Organized all the cans and shoved the last remaining cans of tomato soup into the very back, hidden away because they were a ‘goddamn travesty’ according to the brunette.

Bucky had slowly and methodically put his touch on everything and Steve hadn’t realized how much those little touches had come to mean to him. Not really. He’d been amused at first when he’d noticed them. The little touches of Bucky in his life. Now he felt like they meant something more than they should.

Maybe he was exhausted and confused and putting too much thought into all of it. He shook his head and drained his beer, sitting the bottle in the trash quietly. He then turned off the lights and made his way upstairs, not bothering to dodge the creaky steps because the twins were used to the noises of the house. He peeked into their room to check in on them then opened the door and walked inside when he saw that Alexi’s eyes were open.

“Hey, why are you up?”

“Couldn’t sleep.”

“What’s wrong, baby?” Lexi shrugged as Steve walked around to his side of the bed and knelt beside it. “You can tell me.”

“Too much cookie pizza.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yeah, Daddy. I’m sure.” Steve gave his son a soft smile as he combed gentle fingers through copper hair.

“Want me to read to you?”

“Please.” Lexi pointed to the book on his nightstand and Steve grabbed it, smiling when he saw it was a small collection of H.P. Lovecraft short stories.

“You’re sure you want to read this before bed?”

“Yeah. Lexa’s asleep and Mr. Bucky read Dagon to us earlier. They’re not scary, Daddy.”

“Okay, baby. Which one?”

“ _The Rats in the Walls_.”

Steve nodded with another smile and sat cross-legged on the floor, leaning his back against the nightstand, and then opened the book and began to read.

He didn’t notice the tension melting off of him until three stories later. Lexi was finally asleep, one hand hanging off the bed, face smashed into his pillow and snoring quietly. Lexa had turned in her sleep, curling around her brother. He sighed quietly then sat the book aside and stood, leaning over them to give them gentle kisses and whispered ‘I love you’s’.

He walked to the door to leave their room then turned to watch them sleep for a few more minutes. He just needed a few more minutes to not think about anything but his twins.

***

Bucky hadn’t left. Not the minute he walked out the door. He hung around in the shadows, watching and waiting. He wasn’t sure what he was looking for. Maybe his stupid heart had wanted Steve to call him back. To open the door and chase him down. To pull him into his arms and say he didn’t care how mean Bucky was to him, he’d love him anyway. He’d beg him to stay, to please not leave him or the twins again and Bucky would actually say yes for once.

Bucky would apologize and explain that he hadn’t meant any of it. That he’d just been an asshole because he hadn’t wanted to get close to him, but it hadn’t worked. He hadn’t meant to fall in love with him anyway. Hadn’t meant to care about the twins as much as he did either. But he had and he’d promise that he wasn’t really an asshole. At least not as much of one as he acted toward Steve. Natasha could confirm it if Steve didn’t believe him. He could ask the twins even.

Christ he was being an idiot. None of that would ever happen. Too much had gone on that was wrong. Bucky hadn’t wanted to get close to Steve because he’d fucked up his job with Stark. He didn’t want to do that again. His plan had gone to hell the minute he’d seen Steve and he was struggling with being rude lately because his heart thumped painfully whenever he was being rude or hateful. It didn’t like how shitty he’d been treating Steve. He didn’t like it either. The fucking guilt was eating away at him.

If he hadn’t seen the way that Steve interacted with his children it would have been so much easier. If he hadn’t realized that Steve Rogers was a giant fucking marshmallow. He’d expected someone aloof and flighty when he’d seen the house. But when he’d knocked on the door and Steve let him in he’d seen a gorgeous blonde that loved his children, if the way he’d introduced his children was any indication. And then when he’d been leaving for the night, when Steve had actually apologized for seeming like he wasn’t there for his children, for how it looked, as if he were embarrassed about owning the house that he did, Bucky had seen someone who wished they could spend every waking minute with their children, and that more than anything was really what had started Bucky down this beautiful fucked up road.

And now here he was, being a total creeper as he watched the lights flick off one at a time as Steve moved through the house. He waited until the last light downstairs was out, until Steve’s bedroom light came on, to walk away. Hands in his pockets, shoulders slumped, and head down, tears in his eyes. He was going to have to talk to Natasha wasn’t he? To really talk to her instead of venting at her in small panic-induced moments. Instead of venting for three minutes at a time. Instead of burying himself in a pity party of a couple beers and a bag of coffee and peanut M&Ms. He was going to have to show her the rest of the sketches that had made him fall that much more in love with Steve. He was going to have to lay everything out in the open and it fucking terrified him. Because he knew without a doubt, that Steve Rogers would never love him back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, so the next (and final) chapter will have smut. I dunno what I'm doing in regards to cheesy porn vs not cheesy porn. I'm definitely aiming for not cheesy, so any help/advice would be much appreciated. You can comment here or message me on tumblr if you wanna. Thanks!


	10. Chapter 10

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steve and Bucky get their shit together. The hard way. Finally.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It only took five months, but it's finally done. :D I didn't realize how much stuff there was left to tie up and I hope I managed to tie up all the loose ends. If I didn't, let's pretend I did. :)
> 
> This is something like 16.7k so it's fairly long. The majority of this has been written over the past two days and my brain is officially melted. I did a cursory glance over this but since my brain is melted I'm sure there's errors and I'll fix them later after I have time to recharge.
> 
> Also, there's smut. It sucks. I'm sorry. I tried. Idek at this point.

Bucky texted Natasha even though he knew she was going to be radio silent for a couple more days. He just needed to let some of it out, even if it was in an unanswered text message. She’d get it eventually and then she’d come home and probably throttle him for being so stupid and falling in love with Steve like a fucking dumbass. Maybe she’d shoot him and put him out of his misery.

There wasn’t room for him in Steve’s life. Steve had his job and his house and his twins. He had his shit together. Bucky didn’t have shit. He didn’t have a job or babies or a house. He had a tiny bedroom with a tiny bed and even that belonged to Natasha. Natasha got him the babysitting job. Pulled him in on a mission occasionally. The only job he’d gotten on his own was running security for Stark and he’d fucked that up. He’d fucked Stark and then fucked himself right out of the best job he ever could have had.

No, he took that back. Watching the twins was the best job he could ever have. He adored them so much. They were smart and funny and caring. Everything their father was. He had to hold out for them. It was only a couple more weeks until school ended. After that he’d apologize profusely and then walk away. Steve could find someone else to give them their piano lessons.

Bucky couldn’t do this anymore. He couldn’t go to work every day dreading the fact that he’d have to see Steve, even if he didn’t speak to him. How the hell was he supposed to be able to face him without blubbering like an idiot and telling him how he really felt?  He wanted to tell him and that made the compulsion to march to the door, throw himself at Steve, and confess everything so much harder to resist. He wanted Steve. He wanted the twins. He wanted a life with them. He knew he’d never have it. He’d never be lucky enough to have that life. It was better that he just finish up the job and walk away. He’d have to. He could do it. It couldn’t be harder than anything else he’d ever done in his life.

It was going to be the hardest thing he’d ever done in his entire fucking life. Next to sleeping. Sleep was avoiding him like the plague. He was crying like a moron so there was that, but still you’d think he’d pass out at some point.

***

The next day he woke with a dull headache and puffy eyes from crying himself to sleep and spent twenty minutes standing in the shower, shivering under the cold water before he felt awake enough to actually shower without falling and braining himself on the old cast iron tub. The thing was an antique with clawed feet that Natasha had picked up somewhere could fit three Natasha sized people. She’d had it resurfaced and the enamel done in black instead of the white it used to have been. He hated it, for the most part anyway. Sometimes it was nice to sit in it and watch it fill to the top with water and sink down to his nose. His knees poked up out of the water when he did that, but still it was comforting.

After he got out of the shower he dressed in a pair of baggy jeans there mostly threadbare and a black t-shirt then went into the kitchen to make a cup of coffee. He didn’t at all jump and scream when Natasha opened the front door and practically slammed her way into the house.

“What are you doing here?”

“Got done early. Why aren’t you on your way to work?”

“I don’t get there until almost four.”

“It’s ten ‘til.” He looked at the clock on the microwave, his one addition to Natasha’s place, and yelped.

“Shit!” He ran to the door, swiping his phone and house keys off of the side table then stomped his feet into his boots, and ran toward Steve’s house pretending he didn’t hear Natasha cackling behind him.

He was twenty minutes late when he rushed up the steps and knocked on the door, tried to catch his breath from running the entire way.

When Steve opened the door, probably with a million questions buzzing in his mind, Bucky rushed past him to the kitchen and grabbed a bottle of water from the fridge. He didn’t need Steve to speak to him. Not now. He’d break. He’d fall apart and all of this would end. His world would end.

Steve walked into the kitchen and saw Bucky draining a bottle of water. He looked like he’d run all the way to the house. Looked stricken and upset as he panted for breath. What was going on? Surely if he was having a bad day he’d have stayed home. Steve had seen bad days before, had his own share of bad days after the Army and S.H.I.E.L.D. but this? How Bucky looked? This looked like the epitome of a bad day. Steve wanted to pull Bucky into his arms and promise him everything would be all right. That everything was going to be just fine and if he needed to cry or scream or anything else he could do it and Steve would hold him through it all. He’d wipe his tears and comb his fingers through his hair until he settled, press gentle kisses between those troubled brows, soothe whatever thing was making him hurt.

“Buck? What’s wrong?” Bucky whimpered then shook his head and tossed the bottle into the recycling bin. He looked devastated. “Something’s wrong, Bucky.”

“I’m fine, Rogers.” His voice was just shy of terse; an unhappy medium between wanting to sob and wanting to rail against everything.

“You don’t look fine,” Steve muttered. Bucky snorted.

“I said I’m fine. Go. Let me do my job.”

He could feel the tension in the air, wondered if he’d finally gone too far.

“Whatever is going on, if you need to take a d--”

“Don’t do that. Don’t make exceptions,” he interrupted. God how the fuck did Steve manage to be so fucking polite all the Goddamn time? Especially when Bucky was such an asshole to him.

“I’m not making an exception, Bucky. If you’re compromised you don’t need to be around the twins.”

“I’d never hurt them!” He growled, voice gone low instead of louder. God, he wanted to scream. Wanted to rage. Wanted…fuck. He wanted to throw himself at Steve and beg his forgiveness. Wanted to…Christ he just wanted. Everything. Everything he’d never have. Never allow himself to have.

“I know that.” Steve knew without a shadow of a doubt that Bucky would never hurt the twins. Steve might not trust him with anyone or anything else, himself included, but he trusted Bucky with the twins. “I meant you need to take a break. Take a day for yourself all right?”

Bucky took a shuddering breath in, closing his eyes tightly, and Steve watched as he visibly forced himself to lessen the tension running through his body. “I’m fine, Steve. What’s going on with me doesn’t matter.”

Christ. And Natasha thought _he_ had a complex. “Of course it does. You matter to m…to the kids. They adore you so much and they worry about you.” Just give it all away, Rogers. Just fucking tell him how much you love him. That’ll go over well.

What? “They do?”

“Of course they do.”

“I…care about them too.”

“Then take a day to get whatever is going on straightened out. Okay? We’ll…they’ll still be here tomorrow. I can handle things for a day without you.”

Bucky snorted. “You’d lost without me. Just admit it already.” He still sounded terse but the way Steve’s lips twitched in a half smile let him know he hadn’t completely pissed him off. Though pissing him off had been the plan from the beginning. Still, Bucky couldn’t bring himself to do it right now. It was too hard pretending to hate the man he was stupidly in love with.

_Absolutely_ , Steve thought. He was so fucking lost without Bucky he was stupid with it. “Not completely,” he murmured with a weak smile. “I have been managing fine on my own for the last ten years or so. More or less anyway.” He reached out slowly and rested his hand on Bucky’s shoulder, waiting for the brunette to get pissy and knock it away. Bucky only barely tensed and closed his eyes, taking a steady breath. “Go home, Buck. Take some time for yourself, okay?”

“Yeah. Yeah. I’m…yeah.” Bucky slipped out from under his hand and Steve couldn’t help but feel that Bucky was slipping away from him forever as he walked out of the house, closing the door quietly behind him.

Had he fucked everything up so badly? Not that he’d even really tried anything at this point. Not with knowing how much Bucky hated him. Had he done something terrible to Bucky and not known it? He sighed heavily, shaking his head, and then walked upstairs where the twins had been changing out of their school clothes. They met him in the hallway outside their bedroom and he must have looked as terrible as he felt because they gave him tight hugs without letting him explain that Bucky wouldn’t be there that day. Probably his little spies had already heard it anyway. He didn’t have the heart to tell them that Bucky might never come back. Not when he wasn’t sure himself.

“So, who wants to order out for dinner?”

“We already ordered out this week, daddy. Twice.”

“Yeah, well. We’re allowed when we’re having a bad day.”

“Okay daddy,” Lexi told him with a small smile.

“Mr. Bucky said that too,” Lexa added.

_Of course he did._   “Let’s go get started on your homework.” Steve could do his own later. He’d just be a little sleep deprived but he’d suffered through it plenty of times before. He didn’t need Bucky. He could live without him. He’d done a good job of it so far, he thought. He’d been happy, if not tired and his babies had been happy and not wanting for anything. He’d done well. He didn’t need a gorgeous, grumpy, irritable, grungy, scruffy brunette to help him. He’d be just fine on his own. Like he always was.

***

Bucky shuffled home slowly. He knew Natasha was still there unwinding from her mission but she would want him to talk. He didn’t want to talk. He wanted to avoid everything for the rest of forever. He wanted to go to bed and sleep until he forgot about Steve and the twins. Until his sketches had crumbled away into dust. Until every last reminder he had of them was gone.

He eyeballed the liquor store on the corner like a long lost lover and pondered his emergency credit card. This was technically an emergency right? Steve had sent him home because he’d been so freaked out he couldn’t manage to calm himself down. He was allowed this right? If he couldn’t sleep his way into oblivion maybe he could drink his way there instead. He bit his bottom lip, debating for all of two seconds, before walking into the liquor store and leaving five minutes later with a bottle of tequila for himself and a bottle of vodka for Natasha.

Natasha was sitting on the coffee table staring at the door as if she had been waiting for him to come back. Had Steve called her to let her know? She lifted her phone, tapped something out, and then tossed it on the couch behind her.

“Steve wanted me to let him know when you got home.”

“Why?”

“He’s worried for you.”

“The kids are worried you mean.”

“I never say things I don’t mean, Barnes.”

He shrugged then took the bottle of vodka out of the paper bag and handed it to her. He took out the tequila for himself and then walked into the kitchen to put the paper bag in the recycling bin.

“What’s the occasion,” she asked with a wry smile.

“Me. Failing at everything I’ve ever tried to do.”

“What did you fail at this time?”

“Not falling in love.” He opened his bottle and took a swig, relishing the burn of the liquor and warmth in his stomach. That was better than the icy dread that had consumed him lately. The cold realization that he was in love with a man that would not or could not ever love him back.

“Did you know?”

“Did I know what?”

“That I’d fall in love with him. Even before I realized he was the kid from high school?”

Natasha stared at him for a long moment before opening her vodka and taking a swig. It was the least composed he’d ever seen her and he knew she was fixing to admit to something she didn’t particularly want to.

“I…hoped. Maybe. I just wanted you to be happy.”

“Congrat-u-fucking-lations.” He lifted the tequila bottle in a half-assed salute. “You did it.” It wasn’t fair to her. He knew it wasn’t, but she’d meddled. Planted him at Steve’s with the perfect fucking guy and the perfect fucking kids and knew he wouldn’t be able to keep from falling for them. Had she just expected butterflies and rainbows and roses? They’d fall in love and get their happily ever after? He and Steve would get married and he’d adopt the twins and they’d all be happy? Stuff like that didn’t happen in real life. There wouldn’t be any happy endings. For any of them.

“I didn’t mean…all you’ve been since you started working for him is miserable.” She actually looked like she regretted sending him to Steve’s. She wasn’t hiding for once.

“Yes, thank you. I’d noticed that.” Just because he noticed how terrible she felt didn’t mean he was going to make it easy on her.

“Why can’t you just…” she trailed off shaking her head and he huffed out a wry laugh.

“Why can’t I what? Convince a man that hates me that I love him? That I never meant a word of it?”

“He doesn’t hate you, James! That man has never hated anyone in his entire life. He’s been angry, so angry, and maybe he was a vindictive shit about some things, but he doesn’t hate people. He’s got too much faith in people to hate them. He’s the most decent man I’ve ever known.”

“It doesn’t fucking matter, Natasha! None of this shit matters. This? All of this? Was a huge fucking mistake. I thought…I thought I could…if I made him hate me I wouldn’t get close to him. Yeah, he’s gorgeous. So fucking gorgeous, but it’s not just his looks. It’s _who_ he is.”

“I know.”

“And it’s not fair. It wasn’t fair for you to do this. It wasn’t fair for me to fall in love with him. It’s not fair for me to have to walk away from those babies without letting them know why. And I’m going to have to. I’m going to have to walk away and I’ll never be able to see any of them again.”

“If you walk away you’ll regret it for the rest of your life.”

“I know.”

He took another swig out of his bottle then shook his head and walked away from her. She watched him leave, watched him walk down the hall to his bedroom, and flinched when he slammed his bedroom door shut. She didn’t expect to see him for day or two. She had time help fix things. She had to try.

She had meant to meddle a bit, of course she had, she just hadn’t expected it snowball out of control the way it had. She thought that Steve and Bucky might actually open their fucking mouths and _communicate_. It shouldn’t have been so fucking difficult. All they had to do was talk! She should have known better. Should have known that Bucky wouldn’t want a repeat of what had happened with Stark. Should have known that Steve wouldn’t do anything about Bucky because his morals wouldn’t let him do anything with an employee or colleague. He was too good for that. Would see it as taking advantage of them and the situation.

She didn’t want to tell Bucky about the flowers on the sketches Steve had given him. That would be easiest. Too easy honestly, and she knew she should just do it, but they’d been driving her crazy for weeks with their will they/won’t they bullshit. ‘Course it was her fault, but still. She took another drink of her vodka as she tried to think of a plan that would finally get those two dumbasses together.

In the end Natasha had sent Steve a text letting him know that Bucky was taking another day off work, he’d need it to get over his hangover anyway, and then told Steve that she wanted to take the twins to the zoo on Friday since they were going to be out of school again. She wasn’t going on another mission for at least a week so she had plenty of time to get Steve and Bucky straightened out. Sam might not agree with her methods, and really she didn’t either this time, but it would have to do. She wasn’t just going to give them the answers. They had to work for it a little bit.

***

“James? Get up, you have to work today.” Natasha knocked on his bedroom door and heard grumbling followed by what sounded like a pillow hitting the door. She hadn’t seen him since he’d come in from work with her vodka and his whiskey. He hadn’t come out of his room to eat even, and when she’d felt enough pity instead of irritation she’d taken him a tray with a couple sandwiches, bags of chips, and bottles of water. After he’d left the first and second tray she had stopped taking them. He hadn’t even waited until she had gone to sleep to sneak out of his room to eat either. She’d checked her video feed. At least he was showering. Had showered once anyway. She had heard it late last night and knew that if he didn’t have the small en suite he probably wouldn’t have even done that.

“Fuck off, Natasha.”

“James, if you’re going to quit, you have to at least let Steve know in person. You can’t just drop out of his life with no warning. He’ll just beg me for information about you and I’m not going to be your middleman.”

“No one fucking asked you.”

She sighed heavily then slammed her hand against the door. “Stop feeling sorry for yourself, get off your ass, take a fucking shower, and get your ass ready for work!” She heard the thump of another pillow then shook her head and walked away. He’d come out on his own and if he didn’t then she’d turn Steve loose on him. Not that Steve would do much. Not unless she riled him up. Then he’d turn into the little asshole she knew lived deep inside him.

For now though, she had to go pick up the twins for their trip to the zoo. Yeah, she was using them a little bit, getting them out of the house and trying to force Steve and Bucky to talk to one another, but she mostly really wanted to see them. She hadn’t seen them since a couple weeks before Bucky had started working for them and she missed them. They may not be hers but she still loved them and missed them when she didn’t get to see them as much as she wanted. She’d see them every day if she could. If her life was safe enough for her to be around them that much.

***

Steve watched Natasha drive off with the twins then sighed and went into his studio. Might as well get some painting done while he had the house to himself. Maybe he’d finish the painting he’d started the day he had made Bucky go home. Night, he should say. It had been the middle of the night and he hadn’t been able to sleep. Too worried about Bucky for his mind to quiet enough. So, he’d gone into his studio turned on all the lights and had started to paint. He hadn’t meant for it to be centered around Bucky. He just happened to have painted the canvas that way. He was almost done with it. He’d finish it up and hide it away so no one would find it. So he wouldn’t stare at it and hope for something he couldn’t have. He just had to finish it first.

Hidden amongst the Asters, Tulips, Hyacinths, Coriander, Acacia, Hybrid Delphinium, Anthurium, Zinnia, Baby’s Breath, Burdock, and Columbine were Bucky’s blue-grey eyes peeking out between the flowers. Even the Coriander from the sketch he hadn’t given him was hidden amongst the rest of the riotous blooms. The one of Bucky dancing in the kitchen to _Lonely is The Night_. The only flower not on the painting was the Salt Cedar for guilt that he’d put on his caricature. He’d have added it but he didn’t feel guilty over this painting. No, this one was special. It needed its own new flower. He just wasn’t sure which one yet.

In the end there were too many to choose from. Too many that said all of the words he couldn’t bring himself to voice. The entire canvas was covered with overlapping blooms. Almond blossoms for home. Lavender for loyalty, love, and devotion. Peach blossoms meaning ‘I am your captive’, because he _was_. Whether Bucky knew it or not Steve was his captive and knew it would always be that way. Bucky held his heart and would never know he did. Vervain for enchantment. Arbutus for ‘thee only do I love’. Lemon leaves for everlasting love. Sweet William for ‘grant me one smile’, a wish for the smile he hadn’t gotten, but wanted desperately. And finally, Yew for sorrow. He thought that one was pretty self-explanatory. All of them were if you knew how to read the flowers. Thankfully no one else did. No one but Natasha and she would never see this painting.

He added one last stroke of the icy blue grey he’d mixed that matched Bucky’s eyes as close as possible and then sat the brush in the jar of water with the others. He’d clean them in a little bit. As soon as he could bring himself to move from the painting.

He was covered in almost as much paint as what was on the canvas. Flecks of every color imaginable were drying on his skin and clothes. One color flaking off only to be replaced by greens, blues, reds, and yellows. All of them blending together make the flowers, the curve of Bucky’s eyes, and the glimmer of light. All of them drying and flaking on Steve’s skin. All of them making him just as much a part of the painting instead of just being the painter.

***

When Bucky managed to drag himself out of bed, still feeling sorry for himself, but a little bit more alive than he’d been the last couple days, he saw that it was only a little after ten. He still had a few hours before he had to go tell Steve and the twins it would be his last day. He couldn’t do it anymore. It wasn’t fair. Wasn’t fair for any of them, but he had to. He couldn’t keep doing this. It was breaking his heart. Killing him a little more each day. And maybe he was being over dramatic, but it fucking hurt and he didn’t like it.

It didn’t matter that he was so in love with Steve it hurt. It didn’t matter that he now knew that Steve was the tiny blonde he’d loved from afar in high school. It didn’t matter that he loved the twins. It wouldn’t matter if the piano was the one he’d learned to play on. The sketches didn’t matter. Steve’s stupidly sweet flower signature didn’t matter. The smiles on Bucky’s face that proved that he loved the kids as if they were his own didn’t matter. The smile he’d wanted to give Steve, but couldn’t. None of it could matter because he had to let it go. Even if he had to force himself to do it.

And if he cried a little in the shower, if he wished he hadn’t run out of tequila, if he didn’t feel as brave as he needed to, well…no one was going to know but him. After today he was gone from their lives forever. He’d talk to Coulson and sign back up. He’d get placed on a team as far away from Natasha as he could and he’d get an apartment at the S.H.I.E.L.D. owned complex. He’d go back to doing what he did best. And if a little voice that sounded suspiciously like Natasha whispered ‘running away’ in his ear, well, no one was going to know about that either.

He left an hour early, walking slowly so he’d have time to come up with a reason, _a good enough reason_ , for him to be quitting his job. He couldn’t come up with shit. The only thing that kept pushing to the front of his mind was ‘I can’t work for someone I’m in love with’ and while that would probably get him out of his job since Steve wouldn’t wait to get rid of him, it wasn’t what he wanted to tell him.

When he got to the house and Steve opened the door wearing paint splattered, threadbare jeans and t-shirt, and his annoying hot acetate framed glasses, ‘I love you’ almost tumbled out anyway.

***

Steve frowned at the knock on the door as he stood from his stool, finally ready to step away from the painting. Bucky’s eyes were mocking him. The happy crinkles almost hidden among the flowers, looking for all the world like a pixie peeking through the blooms. Steve had that happy look engrained on his heart and it would probably stay there for the rest of his life even as he mourned it never being directed his way.

There was a second series of gentle knocks and he sighed wondering who the hell it was. Who dared to interrupt his moping? This one last day he’d mope and whine about Bucky and maybe he’d cried a little bit toward the end of the painting but no one was going to know that but him. He glared at the painting. He wouldn’t sell it, not like he did the rest of his paintings, but he wouldn’t keep it either. Maybe he’d hang it in the Art Department. Somewhere he wouldn’t have to see it unless he absolutely had to go there. He usually didn’t so he figured it was safe enough. Though, he didn’t know if he’d ever be able to resist the temptation to go look at it if it was that close to him all the time.

He sighed heavily taking one last lingering look at the painting then made his way out of the studio and down the stairs. He opened the door without checking to see who it was just because he figured it was Sam coming over to check on it. Instead it was the one person he wished he didn’t have to see when he was feeling so raw. When he was angry at himself for falling in love with such an asshole. When he was in pain because he knew nothing would ever happen for it. When he’d just left his heart bleeding on a twenty-four by thirty-six inch canvas. What the fuck was he supposed to say? What the fuck was he supposed to do?

“Um…hi?” There, that was something. ‘Try again’ a little voice whispered. A voice that sounded like Sam. Well, he needed to butt out. Tiny voice Sam didn’t know what he was talking about. Bucky looked a little lost and Steve wondered if it was for whatever reason he’d been panicking the other day. If it was because he hadn’t replied to any of his texts asking if he was all right.

“Hey.” Bucky tucked a lock of his hair behind one ear as he gave Steve a weak half-smile and then bumped into him when he didn’t move as he tried to step into the house.

“The twins aren’t home.”

Bucky blinked confusedly, looking too fucking adorable for Steve’s heart to handle, and fussed with his hair again. “What?”

Goddamn it, Natasha. Steve sighed heavily then stepped aside to let Bucky in the house. He could at least do that much while he explained or tried to explain the situation. “They didn’t have school today. Natasha took them to the zoo.”

“Oh.” Good. That was good. That meant there wouldn’t be tiny ears around to hear him give Steve some bullshit excuse as to why he was quitting, but also…fuck Natasha for putting him in this situation. Again. He was going to make her life a living hell after this. He’d figure out a way to do it.

“She was supposed to tell you.”

“She didn’t.”

“Oh. You uh…want to come in? Have a beer or something?” He knew it was pointless to ask. Bucky would look offended and tell him no again. Just like he always did.

Bucky gulped. He needed to tell Steve he was quitting. Needed to do it when the twins weren’t home, but he wasn’t sure being alone with Steve was a good idea anymore. Especially if they were going to drink a beer. Even just one and Bucky knew he’d break and confess everything. It would kill him to do it. He couldn’t. Not now. Not ever.

“No. I have to go.” He couldn’t be in the same house as Rogers without the twins as a buffer between them. Not for this, not now. He’d text him. It was cowardly, but it was probably the only way he’d survive it. He turned to leave but stopped mid-step when Steve spoke.

“The fuck is your problem?” Steve winced as he asked it. Snapped the words out more like, but his nerves were frazzled, his heart was torn in pieces, and he honestly didn’t give a shit what happened now. He couldn’t keep going through this.

“Excuse me?” He didn’t know if he could do this. Could keep pretending to be a douchebag. Fuck. One last time. One last time was all he needed. Five minutes tops and then he could go home and sort his shit out. Or cry into his M&Ms. _Something_. He steeled himself for whatever conversation he and Steve would wind up having. He could do this. He _could._ He didn’t survive active warzones and S.H.I.E.L.D. to run away from doing the right thing. Now, whether that thing was right for him or for Steve and the twins he didn’t want to know.

“I’ve been trying. Since day fucking one I’ve been trying.”

“Trying what, Rogers?”

“To be your friend,” Steve snapped. Christ what the fuck did Bucky think he was talking about? “Do I smell? Have I done something horrible to you? Made some egregious error and didn’t realize it? Am I so fucking horrible that you can’t stand me? What did I do to you that you continuously treat me like shit and shut me out? God knows the only fucking reason I’ve kept you on is because the twins adore you and I can tell you care about them as much as they care about you. But when it comes to me? You’re only ever an asshole.”

“You didn’t do anything.” He couldn’t. God, he was so fucking stupid!

“So what is it? Why do you hate me?”

“Hate you?” He couldn’t do this shit. He had to leave before he did something epically stupid. Like fucking kiss Steve to shut him up. Tell him he had it all wrong and Bucky had never hated anyone as much as he _didn’t_ hate Steve.

Steve shrugged then walked away from him. Bucky stepped into the house and shut the door quietly behind him even though he knew better. His heart was pounding, adrenaline rushing through him. His flight response was kicking in, but no. He had to know what Steve was going to do. Going to say. If he was going to walk away he needed to at least let Steve speak his mind. He needed to memorize every word so he could torture himself with it later. It would be nothing less than what he deserved.

“It’s the only reason I can think of for why you won’t even talk to me without managing to be an ass.” Why the fuck else would Bucky continuously treat him like shit?

“Every time I try to talk to you lately you run the fuck away! How the hell am I supposed to be nice to you when you tuck tail and run?” That was total bullshit. He hadn’t tried to talk to Steve at all until now. Not really. He hadn’t actually gotten the chance, but only because he hadn’t given himself one. Besides he had to say something that wasn’t ‘I love you, I’m sorry’.

“It’s too little too fucking late, Buck. Why the fuck would I stay to try and talk when you’ve only ever treated me like a fucking piece of gum stuck to the bottom of your goddamned shoe?”

That was true, but also a good place for Bucky to end the conversation and get the fuck out. Fuck this letting him speak his mind shit. He couldn’t deal with it. “Whatever. I’m fucking going. Consider this my resignation.” He turned to leave and yelped when Steve slammed his hand against the door to hold it shut.

“Don’t do that to the twins. Us fighting has nothing to do with them. They love you, Buck.” _I love you. I hate you so goddamn much, but I love you too._

“Move your fucking hand before you lose it.” He didn’t doubt neither of them would come out on top. They’d both been trained by Natasha and Coulson. It would end with both of them bruised and bleeding onto the carpet.

Steve snorted disdainfully and Bucky shuddered feeling that warm huff of air on the back of his neck. Oh this was bad. This was so bad.

“What are you going to do, Buck?”

Bucky reached up, lightning fast, and wrapped his hand around Steve’s wrist then hooked his foot around Steve’s ankle. He twisted and spun them around, shoving Steve face first into the door with his arm twisted behind his back.

“I’m leaving.” He spun again, pulling Steve away from the door and pushing him toward the living room. He turned back to the door and barely had it open when two hundred and twenty pounds of muscle slammed into him hitting him against the door and causing it to slam shut. Steve spun him around, shoving his shoulders until his back hit the door. Both of them were panting and Bucky swallowed heavily when he saw that Steve’s pupils were dilated. He trailed his eyes down Steve’s body, over heaving pecs, down his muscled abdomen, past his hips and zeroing in on the impressive bulge between his thighs. “Oh.” He felt his own pupils and body respond in kind and licked his lips. What the fuck just happened?

Steve groaned and slid a hand from Bucky’s shoulder to grip the back of his neck in a possessive hold. “I hate you so fucking much.”

“I know.” He rested his hands on Steve’s hips tentatively, gripping harder when Steve made no move to pull away from him. “I know.”

Steve surged forward, closing those last few inches between them and slammed his lips against Bucky’s. Bucky moaned as they bit at each other’s mouths, hands wandering and finally getting to touch and grasp and feel the muscled body he’d lusted after since the first time he’d seen Steve. He dug his fingers into Steve’s back, pulling him closer and Steve slotted a knee between his thighs, pressing against his cock and making him gasp into the kiss that was only growing more violent.

“I hate you,” Steve panted against his skin as he trailed licks and sharp bites across his jaw and to the spot just under his ear that drove him crazy. Steve bit down hard and Bucky jolted, grinding against Steve’s knee.

“Yeah. I know.” I’m sorry.

Bucky shoved his hands down the back of Steve’s stupid paint splattered jeans and grasped handfuls of taut flesh, kneading the muscles and pulling Steve even closer as Steve  He spread Steve cheeks apart, cold fingers of his metal hand sliding between them and pressing against his hole. Softly at first and then hard enough to push the tip of one finger inside him. He knew it was cold, knew it wasn’t nearly slick enough, but Steve yelped, rising up on his toes, and then sighed and sank back down taking more of his finger inside him.

“Holy shit.”

“Uh huh.”

“Wanted you from the first minute I saw you,” Steve panted. “But you’re such a fucking asshole!”

“Well, I’m tryin’.” Steve groaned thunking his forehead against Bucky’s clavicle.

“That was fuckin’ terrible,” he grumbled, biting at the skin under his mouth.

“Yeah. It’s working though ain’t it?” Steve bit down hard enough to leave an impression of his teeth and Bucky yelped, jerking and shoving his finger further inside Steve. Steve growled, practically gnawing his way down to Bucky’s nipple, rocking his hips back onto the cold metal and Bucky whimpered when those perfect lips wrapped around the hard nub and teeth followed. “Steve.” The blonde shook his head, shoving Bucky’s hand away from his ass then gripped Bucky’s thighs and hoisted him up against the door, slamming him hard enough that his head thunked against the glass. “Oh, God.” Holy fucking shit Bucky had been missing out. He knew he weighed close to two fifty because of the weight of his arm, but Steve had lifted him like he didn’t weigh a fucking thing. Like Bucky was the twink Steve had been in high school. Why was that so fucking hot?

“Done doing shit your way, Buck.”

Bucky stared at him for a moment before nodding. “Yeah, okay.” This was fine. Totally fine. Everything was fine.

Steve gave him a harsh kiss, biting at his mouth and fucking his tongue inside, and then pulling away to shove two fingers in between his lips. “Slick ‘em up.”

Christ, why was that so hot? He moaned letting saliva pool in his mouth then used his tongue to spread it around. Covering Steve’s skin with as much as he could, moaning again at the taste of Steve’s skin and the acrylic paints he didn’t have the mind to wonder whether they were non-toxic or not. He licked between Steve’s fingers one last time then pushed them out of his mouth with a sigh. He couldn’t wait to feel them. Knew it wouldn’t be enough, but didn’t care.

“Shit. Fucking clothes.” Steve grumbled against his mouth. Bucky nodded then lowered his legs from around his waist. He watched carefully as Bucky stripped off his shirt, kicked off his boots, and shoved his jeans down, only managing to free one leg before jumping back up and tightening his legs around Steve’s hips once more, hands scrabbling as he shifted and fought with the button and fly of Steve’s jeans. Steve heard the thin denim tear and kissed Bucky again so he wouldn’t have to hear him talk when he started to apologize. He couldn’t handle that right now. He pinned Bucky to the wall again as he used his dry hand to shove his jeans down far enough to get his cock out.

Cold fingers wrapped around the length and Steve shuddered when he realized Bucky must have spit in his hand. He pulled back to look and nearly came when he saw the shining silver digits wrapped around him. He’d never un-see it and knew there would be a page or ten in his sketchbook of this moment.

“Gonna fuck me or not,” Buck asked after a moment of watching Steve staring at his hand. Jeez it was like the guy had never seen anyone’s hand wrapped around his dick before. Goddamn the thing was fucking huge too. Bucky stroked him again hoping he’d get with the program already even though he knew it was going to sting like a bitch, but feel so damn good, and then yelped when Steve reached down and shoved his spit slick fingers in up to the hilt. “Fuck!”

“I’m gonna.”

Bucky couldn’t help but snort even while Steve fucked him unceremoniously with his fingers. He pulled them out only to spit on them again and jabbed them straight into his prostate. “Oh, you fuckin’ asshole.”

“Tryin’.”

“Shut up, Steve. God.” He dropped his head back against the door, wincing when he heard the little glass window crack, but Steve only pulled is fingers out, lifted him higher, stepped closer, and Bucky’s vision whited out when he felt the insistent pressure of Steve’s cock against his woefully underprepared hole. He grunted, squeezed his own cock to keep from coming as Steve pressed all the way in, cock dragging perfectly over his prostate.

He didn’t know which end was up anymore. Steve was fucking him hard and fast against the door, slamming him into the wood hard enough that he heard the glass cracking again. He didn’t give a shit. All he cared about was that Steve was finally fucking him. He’d have time to hate himself over it later.

Steve’s hands slipped off of his hips and he held on tighter, fingers digging into the blonde’s shoulders to keep himself up. Pressing his back against the door and rolling his hips as much as he could. Helping Steve keep that perfect angle. Steve sped up, how the fuck was he keeping that pace while holding him up? And the next thing Bucky knew his sight clouded over and he heard a high pitched whimper that sounded suspiciously like his own voice and Steve panting in his ear, telling him well he was taking it. How good he was. How perfect he felt rippling around Steve’s cock like that. How gorgeous he looked when he came. When had he come?

Steve grunted, thrusting deep one last time and then collapsed, bring Bucky down with him when his legs gave out. Bucky wound up straddling him, head resting on his chest as they tried to catch their breaths.

It was only after Bucky managed to take a full breath and lift his head from Steve’s chest that he realized that Steve had somehow managed to keep those stupidly sexy glasses on the entire time he’d been railing him against the door. He smiled dopily, combing his fingers through Steve’s sex mussed hair. “Christ, I fuckin’ love you. Loved you since you were that punky little twink in high school.” Steve tensed and Bucky realized what he’d just said. Oh, shit. Oh, fuck! His high left for strange waters and left him trembling from coming down too fast.

High school? The hell was he talking about? “What?”

Bucky scrambled off of Steve’s lap, wincing at the slight burn of Steve’s cock sliding out of him and the feel of Steve’s come seeping out after and scrambled to find his clothes, pushing Steve away when he stood and tried to grab him. “Don’t! Don’t touch me!” He yanked his jeans on, wincing again as the fabric stuck to his tacky skin and smeared come all over his ass and thighs.

“Buck, just wait a minute.”

“No. I have to go. Goddamn it! Where’s my fucking shirt?” Bucky spun in a circle looking for the black t-shirt then jerked it out of Steve’s hand, grabbed his boots, and fled. Completely ignoring the sounds of Steve calling after him. He didn’t want to know what Steve was going to say. Didn’t want to know what he was going to do.

He ran, barely stopping to hop on one foot at a time to get his boots on, not bothering with the laces, and then pulling his shirt over his head. He knew he looked like a maniac as he ran through the middleclass neighborhood. There was no telling what Steve’s neighbors were thinking, seeing a half-naked man running down the sidewalk. He was too panicked to care really. He had to get home.

***

 “Bucky!” Goddamn it! Steve jerked his torn jeans up and rushed out onto the porch hoping to catch Bucky before he got too far. He couldn’t chase after him without losing his jeans since Bucky had all but torn them off of him and one mostly naked guy running through the neighborhood was more than enough. Bucky was already halfway down the block, hopping from foot to foot as he pulled his boots on and then finally his shirt. “Fuck. Fucking hell!”

He groaned scrubbing his hands over his face as he stood on the doorway watching Bucky run away from him. God he’d fucked up. He’d never fucked up so bad in his life. Natasha was going to kill him. She was going to kill him and take the twins and he’d never get to see them grow up because of how epically fucking stupid he was.

What the hell was that about anyway? Bucky loved him? Had since high school? Steve hadn’t had any friends in high school. Had gotten the shit beat out of him on a regular basis for not taking anyone’s crap. So what the hell was Bucky talking about? Probably he was just confused about it. Got Steve twisted up with someone else in his head. Bucky loved him? Some past version of him that didn’t exist? One part of him wanted to drag Bucky back to him and tell him he loved him too. Promise him the world if he’d just stay. The other part of him wanted to know what the fuck was going on.

But first, before he could figure out what to do about the situation he’d found himself in with Bucky, he needed to come up with a plan that didn’t involve Natasha killing him. He couldn’t call her. Not while she was with the twins. So he’d call the next best person. Maybe he could help him figure shit out.

Steve backed into the house, closed and locked the door, then stripped out of his jeans to keep from tripping over them and made his way upstairs to his bedroom. He’d call Sam and ask him to come over and then take a shower. He could still smell Bucky on his skin, his come painted on his stomach. He needed it gone. Couldn’t stand the fact that he’d fucked Bucky in anger. If they’d actually managed to talk to each other, if Steve had actually listened to Sam, it could have been avoided and their first time wouldn’t have been an angry fuck against the door to the house.

He could’ve drawn all of his flowers on Bucky’s skin. Told him what they all meant. Told him he loved him and had since the first time he’d seen him playing outside with the twins. When he’d seen that happy smile. Now he’d never see it again. He knew Bucky wouldn’t come back. Not now. Not after this. Steve would have to find a way to talk to him. He’d have to figure out how though.

He sighed, scrubbing his hands over his face to get rid of his tears and dialed Sam’s number. Sam answered after the second ring and Steve bit back a sob. “Sam? I fucked up.”

***

Bucky didn’t stop running until he got to his room, locked the door, and threw himself on his bed. He had to leave soon. Steve would tell Natasha what had happened and he’d have to find somewhere else to live because Natasha was going to kill him when she found out what he’d done. She’d string him up and torture him first probably. What the hell was he going to do? He couldn’t go back. There wasn’t a point now. He’d fucking told Steve he loved him and he knew by the shock in Steve’s eyes it had been less than reciprocated. He’d been right about Steve hating him and Natasha had been so very, very wrong.

He sniffled, hating himself for crying, and curled into a ball on his bed, dragging his pillows and blanket over him like a cocoon. It didn’t help any, but he could at least pretend it did.

***

Steve paced in the living room, waiting for Sam to show up. It had been twenty minutes since he’d called and it hadn’t really been that long honestly, but it felt like a fucking lifetime. Too fucking long for Steve to deal with the mess his head had turned into all by himself. He should be able to. Should be able to figure shit out on his own, but shit, sometimes he just needed help. Even if he hated to admit it. Thing was though, he already knew what Sam was going to say.

Sam would tell him the same shit he had told him before. About the puzzle pieces and seeing if they fit right. And they did. _They did._ But did Bucky really love him? Or was he still hung up on some kid he used to go to school with? Who did that? Steve had had his own high school crush, had even wound up punching the guy in the face once after he’d stepped in when Steve was getting his ass beat by some jock on the football team, but that didn’t mean he’d been in love and pining for him for the last twenty years.

Steve didn’t usually punch his crushes in the face either though. The guy had been on the baseball team and the minute Steve had seen those stupid eyes and his stupidly fine jaw he’d gotten his first real crush and would watch for him in the halls between classes. One day Steve had smarted off to some dipshit and gotten beat up for it and the baseball guy had punched the other guy, kicked him in the ass, and sent him on his way. When he’d turned to Steve to ask him if he was okay Steve had panicked and punched him, snarling that he didn’t need the help and then run away. So, yeah. That was a thing that had happened. Didn’t mean he still had a crush on the guy or anything though.

He heard Sam’s car pulling up and all but ran to the door, swinging it open and stepping out onto the porch, bouncing from foot to foot. Sam grabbed something out of the passenger seat and then got out of the car. Steve saw that it was a paper bag and knew that Sam had stopped at the liquor store on the way over.

“I can’t get drunk. Don’t know when Natasha’s bringing the twins back.”

“This ain’t for you. If I have to talk you down from your crazy gay white boy shit I’m going to need it. It goes without saying that if you had listened to me in the first place none of this would have happened. Just so you know.” Sam grinned at he said it, letting Steve know he was joking, but it kinda fell flat. Steve wasn’t in a very joking mood and any other time he would have found it funny, like he always did when Sam jokingly bitched about his gay white boy shit, but not now. He did give Sam a weak smile for his efforts though.

“You just said it, Sam.”

“Well, now it goes without saying.” Sam wrapped his arm around Steve’s shoulders and then led him into the house, closing the door after them. “Come on. You can have a couple drinks while you tell me what exactly happened.” Sam dragged him into the kitchen and sat him at the table then pulled out a bottle of whiskey and grabbed two juice glasses. They belonged to the twins and t seemed kind of absurd that he and Sam were fixing to drink hard liquor from cups that had a cartoon solar system on them with a tiny pitiful looking Pluto off to one side. Steve grabbed one as soon as Sam filled it then downed it like a shot.

“We got into a minor altercation and then I fucked my nanny. He told me he loves me and then ran away. Said he’d been in love with me since high school? But I have never seen him before in my life so he’s gotta have me confused with someone else.”

“Did you look in your yearbook?”

“Really? I tell you I fucked my nanny and you’re talking about yearbooks? Sam, that’s got nothing’ to do with this. I fucked up! I fucking took adva…I have never in my life fucked someone like I did him, okay. It wasn’t…”

“Making love. I know you, Steve.”

“What if I hurt him?”

“Did he tell you to stop? Did he ever act like he didn’t want you to fuck him?”

“No. Told me to hurry up.”

“Okay then. Now aside from your guilt complex eating you alive, what else are you freaking out about?” Sam poured Steve’s glass almost all the way, leaving just a finger’s breadth at the top so he wouldn’t spill it when he picked it up to take a drink.

“What am I not freaking out about might be the better question.” Steve sniffled and wiped his eyes then grabbed his glass and stood, motioning for Sam to follow him.

“Oh, hey, what happened to your door? The glass is broken?”

“That would be Bucky’s head.”

“Steve! You fucking shoved his head through the glass?”

“No! Oh, my God Sam! He threw his head back when we were fuckin’.”

“Oh! Ohhh…” Sam blinked at the cracked glass on their way past the door. “Damn.”

“Mmm.”

Steve led Sam upstairs and to the studio. It felt like it had been years since he’d been up there instead of just a couple hours. So much had happened in so little time and he didn’t know what to fucking do. What to say. How to say it. He didn’t even really want to talk to Sam, because he would just remind him he that he wasn’t as big of a fuck up as he felt like right now and he kind of wanted to wallow in it a bit, felt like he deserved it. Deserved to suffer a bit for being so fucking stupid. And he knew he usually wasn’t like this, but damn it. Bucky had gotten him all twisted up and he didn’t know which way was up anymore.

He knew he’d fucked up by not talking to Bucky, but it had been so Goddamn hard. He could barely speak to him anyway, and now that Steve was thinking about it somewhat it reminded him of having his crush in high school. He’d either been mooning over him or spitting mad at him and there wasn’t any in between. He hadn’t been able to talk because he’d felt so fucking tongue tied and it had led to all this. Bucky being an asshole all the time hadn’t helped, and if he was in love with him like he claimed why the hell had he been such a fucking douchecanoe?

“Steve? What’s here that I need to see?” Sam watched Steve, watched whatever dangerous thoughts were running through his head. He knew Steve was already talking himself out of asking him for anything. Whether it be comfort or an affirmation or anything else. He knew Steve wanted to wallow, but a wallowing Steve was not a good or healthy Steve and definitely not the Steve the twins would need when they got home.

“The painting.” Steve took a healthy drink of his whiskey and waved his free hand toward the easel that was set up at the other end of the room.

Oh, no. Sam walked over to it and immediately saw Bucky’s eyes surrounded by flowers. “Steve.”

“I know. I didn’t mean to paint it. It just happened.”

“And the flowers? What do those mean?” He knew a couple of them. Had seen them in Steve’s sketchbook before he’d given the sketches to Bucky, but there were a few he hadn’t seen before. He knew this was probably going to be the only way for him to get Steve to actually talk about this before Natasha brought the twins home. If Steve had to tell him through the flowers then he’d let him. Steve walked over to him and raised a hand toward the canvas, fingers hovering over the still partially wet paint. He sobbed once and Sam sat him in the floor and held him tight as he let go of everything he’d been holding in since Bucky had started working for him.

They weren’t curled up on the floor in the studio when Natasha returned with the twins but only just barely. She followed the twins in, took one look at Steve, her face fell and then went blank, and she left without a word to any of them except for the hugs and kisses goodbye for the twins.

***

Bucky stayed curled up on his bed not moving and barely breathing until he heard Natasha come in, slamming the door shut behind her. He whimpered sliding off of the bed to crawl under it and flinched when she banged on his door.

“James!” Maybe if he was quiet she’d leave. If only he was that lucky. She had probably gone over the security footage on her phone and had seen him curled up on his bed for hours. “James, open the door. What the hell is going on? Steve’s hysterical. And I don’t mean minor hysterics like before. He’s literally freaking the fuck out. What happened?” He heard the doorknob rattle and crawled out from under the bed in time for Natasha to push the door open. He was embarrassed enough without her finding him under it.

Natasha stepped into the room slowly, her eyes taking everything in, finally landing on the stack of sketches on his nightstand. She walked over to them and picked them up, her face betraying nothing as she looked them over one by one.

Natasha’s eyes flicked to Bucky where he was curled in on himself against the side of his bed then back to the sketches. She should have known Steve would keep drawing Bucky and the twins. It looked like there was a sketch for every day that Bucky had been working for him. Maybe two sketches on some days. In each of them was at least one flower. On most of them there was more than one. Asters and Hyacinths, Tulips and Acacia, Burdock and roses, Baby’s Breath, Hybrid Delphinium and Anthurium. He’d drawn Bucky love letters. She knew the first two sketches Steve had given him had the Delphinium for ardent attachment and a hyacinth asking for forgiveness, but these were more. And she knew that Bucky had no idea what they meant.

“James.” When he didn’t look at her she tried again. “Bucky. What happened?”

“Nothing. Nothing happened.”

“Look at me.” He shook his head and she sighed sitting the sketches back on the nightstand then sat next to him. She combed her fingers through his tangled hair, brow rising when she saw a hickey on his neck. “Bucky, tell me what happened? Steve couldn’t talk to me because the twins were home so we couldn’t get into it.”

“I had sex with Steve.”

It was about time. Although from the way both men were freaking out it had either been terrible or something had happened afterward.

“And I told him I loved him.”

“You love him?”

“You fucking knew that!” He jerked away from her, fussing with his shirt and she glanced down to see a bruise in the shape of a bite mark over is pec. Oh. Angry sex then. “I didn’t mean to tell him. It just slipped out. He had those stupid fucking glasses on and he’d kept them on the whole time and when I realized it the words just came out and I freaked. He freaked. It…I can’t go back, Natasha.”

She sighed then pulled him into a tight hug. “Why not?”

“That was my job. I love those kids and I love their dad and I fucked everything up, but we were so angry with each other, or well…we were both angry at me and it just happened and I can’t…I fucked up.”

“How do you know you fucked up? Did he say you did?” Steve wouldn’t have told him even if he had was the thing. Both men had fucked up probably. If they had just opened their fucking mouths none of this would have happened the way it did. Maybe she shouldn’t have meddled, but damn it, they were perfect for each other. If only they’d open their fucking eyes.

“He didn’t need to,” Bucky sobbed. “I saw the look in his eyes. You can’t hate fuck and then tell the other guy that you love him.”

“Hate sex and angry sex are two different things, Barnes.”

“He hates me, Natasha! I made him fucking hate me! He told me he hated me!”

“He doesn’t hate you, James. Even if he said he did, I’m sure he was just fed up. He doesn’t mean it.”

Bucky shrugged her off, shaking his head. “Just leave me alone.”

Fuck it. Neither one of them was going to pull their heads from their asses apparently. She sighed then reached over and grabbed the sketches. She wouldn’t tell him what the flowers meant, not all of them, but maybe a couple. He’d have to do the rest of it himself. “Do you know what all these flowers mean?” She shoved the stack of paper under his nose. “Did you even see them?”

“Of course I saw them. Steve always puts them there. Like a signature. They’re just stupid little flowers, Natasha.” Though there wasn’t anything stupid about the sketches.

“Did you know that during the Victorian era people used flowers to send messages? Flowers have meanings and not many people know it or know much of them beyond red roses for love or Baby’s Breath for purity and innocence. But Steve does. Get a book on the names and meanings of flowers. You’ll see.” She shifted through the stack until she found the one with the hyacinth that Steve had given him as an apology for bringing up what he thought were Bucky’s panic attacks. “This one, the hyacinth, it means an apology. Forgive me. When did he give it to you?”

“After he talked at me about panic attacks.”

“Uh huh.” She flipped through them again until she found the Delphinium. “This one? It means ardent attachment.” His brow furrowed as he looked up at her and she nodded. “Get the book, Barnes.” She gave him a gentle smile then kissed his cheek. “Are you going to be okay?”

“I don’t know.” He really didn’t. If Natasha was telling him the truth it changed a lot of things. He didn’t know if it was for the better or for the worse, but he’d find out. “Eventually, I guess.”

***

Steve sat the twins down on the couch and then sat on the coffee table in front of them. He hadn’t known that telling them Bucky wouldn’t be coming back would be this fucking hard. He had meant to tell them all weekend, but hadn’t been able to bring himself to do it. Every time he opened his mouth to let them know he’d choked on the words. He couldn’t do it and now it was Monday again. The twins would be expecting Bucky to be here after they got home from school. They had known something had happened while they’d been gone with Natasha, but not that it involved Bucky. Now he had to tell them he’d gotten into a fight with their nanny and they’d hate him for it. Hate him for running Bucky off. They’d be disappointed in him and that was one of the things he feared the most as their father. They had Natasha’s disappointed look down pat and seeing it in double was almost too much for his heart to take.

“Daddy?”

“Yeah, baby?” He looked up at Alexa, hadn’t even realize he’d been staring at the floor for however long.

“What’s going on? You’ve been sad since Friday.”

“I haven’t been sad, baby.”

“Don’t lie to us, Daddy,” Alexi snapped. “We’re not stupid. You been sad since Auntie Tasha brought us home after the zoo. And Uncle Sam was here and you’d been crying. And Uncle Sam looked upset.”

“Did you and Uncle Sam get into a fight?”

“No, Lexa.” He sighed then took a steadying breath. “Bucky and I got into a fight.”

“What?”

“Auntie Tasha was supposed to tell him that she was taking you to the zoo and out to dinner so he didn’t need to come Friday. She didn’t do that and he came over. I asked…I asked him to stay for a beer because I really like him, but he didn’t want to and that’s okay. That’s fine, you know?” The twins both nodded and he knew he was getting ahead of himself, but he couldn’t…not do it. “Anyway, Daddy and Bucky said some things to each other that we didn’t mean and Bucky…quit.” He didn’t need to have that conversation with Bucky to know the brunette had quit. The unanswered phone calls and text messages were confirmation enough. Steve had just wanted to apologize and see if they couldn’t maybe meet somewhere to talk, but Bucky hadn’t answered him.

“What?” Lexa sounded so heartbroken that Steve had to bite back his own sob. “But…he said he was going to teach us the piano and help with the science fair and who’s gonna help us with math and Lexi’s reading?”

“I am baby. Just like always.”

“No! You don’t do it like he does!” Lexi jumped up and stomped away from him then spun back around. “He promised us. And you made him break it.”

“What did he promise, Lexi?”

“The science fair! We were going to make a volcano, but he said he could get some stuff from someone he used to work with that would make the lava look real.”

“That’s cheating.”

“Not like we’re going to get to do it now anyway, are we? Come on, Lexa.” Steve watched his little boy walk to the door and grab his backpack off the hook then turned to his baby girl. Lexa looked torn between following after her brother and staying with Steve.

“We’re not done talking, Alex. We don’t walk away from each other angry.”

“You ran Mr. Bucky off.”

“I didn’t run him off, Alexi.” Steve didn’t even fucking know anymore. “Bucky chose to leave. A lot of stuff happened that you don’t know, don’t understand, and I tried to apologize to him. I tried calling him and texting him but he didn’t answer me.”

“You have to do something else! Go see him! He lives with Auntie Tasha. You can go over and talk to him. He can’t not answer you if you’re there with him.”

“It doesn’t work like that, baby. I can’t just show up at his place and force him to talk to me.” Though it did sound like a better plan than the few he’d come up with over the weekend. “That would be wrong.”

“But you gotta do something!”

“I’ll try, baby. Okay? I can’t promise he’ll come back even if I do manage to talk to him and apologize. I know you two loved having him here and I’m sorry I screwed it all up, but I’ll try to fix it.” He sighed again then stood and took Alexa’s hand pulling her up and walking her to the door. “It’s almost time for the bus.”

“Will you bring Mr. Bucky back today, Daddy?”

“I can’t promise that, baby. You know I can’t. I’d love to be able to bring him back, but I don’t know if he would even want to come back. I’m sorry.” He handed Alexa her bag from the hook then opened the door.

“Does he not like us anymore?”

“Oh, God. No honey.” Steve crouched down in front of the twins to get eye level with them. “Bucky cares for you so much. I know he does. He’s mad at Daddy right now and that’s why he’s not here, but I know he cares about you.”

“Then he should be here.”

“It’s not that easy, baby. Adults are complicated and I can’t explain it well enough, but trust me when I say that nothing about me and Bucky is going to be easily fixed. I’m going to try though.” He heard the bus coming down the block then gave them quick hugs and kisses on the cheek. “The bus is almost here. Have a good day today, okay? I love you.”

“We love you too, Daddy.” The Shining twins spoke and he smiled softly.

“Go on, now.” They walked out after he turned them loose from their hug and he stepped out onto the porch to watch them run down the sidewalk and yell for some of the other kids. Like always they turned to wave when they reached the corner to wait for the bus and he waved back, watching them until they were on the bus and gone from his sight.

He walked back in the house, swung the door shut behind him, and sighed. He had to fix this. He needed to fix it anyway, but he really wanted to fix it for the twins. If he and Bucky could at least get on civil terms then he could come back for the twins. Steve knew he’d never take anything out on them so didn’t worry about that. He just wanted his babies to be happy and right now they weren’t because they knew or thought they knew that Bucky wasn’t coming back.

He grabbed his mobile from the coffee table as he came up with a plan. It wasn’t half-baked at best, but it might work. He couldn’t get Bucky on the phone, knew Natasha wouldn’t help him with it either. He didn’t want to bother Sam with it any more than he already had. No, he could do this on his own and he might just have an idea as to how he was going to make it happen. He just couldn’t do it while at work. Hence the phone call he needed to make. He had sick and vacation days stacked up so using one or two of them wouldn’t hurt. He hated to use them for personal reasons, and it was going to suck when he went back, but he figured his students would appreciate the break.

***

“Are you alive?”

Bucky blinked back into awareness and saw Natasha’s concerned face hovering over his. Her red hair was pulled back into a ponytail, something he’d never seen before and she wasn’t wearing any makeup. Oh, no. “No. I’m still dead. Leave me alone.” He rolled over and yelped when she jabbed his ribs.

“Come on, you’ve been moping since Friday. We’ve got a mission.”

“Yeah? I get to shoot someone?”

She bobbed her head side to side in thought for a moment before shrugging. “Maybe. Go take a shower. Wear civvies.”

“Okay.”

Thirty minutes later he and Natasha were sitting in a fucking coffee shop with two cups of coffee and two strawberry something flavored pastries between them. He wasn’t sure what they were, only that Natasha had ordered for them while he’d scoped out the place. Now he was pouting into his coffee mug while Natasha stared smugly. She’d finally gotten him out of bed. Good for her. She should feel so fucking proud. He glared at her and that smug smile widened.

“You may have won the battle, but you didn’t win the war.”

She laughed at that and he sighed then picked up the Danish or whatever the hell it was Natasha had ordered him. He didn’t even want the damn thing. Didn’t want the coffee either. He wanted to go back to bed and be left alone again. He knew she was going to make him talk, but he didn’t want to. She knew she’d ask if he’d at least Googled the flowers on his sketches, he hadn’t, wasn’t going to. She couldn’t make him. Actually she probably could, but he didn’t want that to happen. He’d have to do it eventually he guessed, he just wasn’t ready yet. He was still too panicked to deal with the fact that Steve might actually love him back.

It should’ve been easy, right? He could find out what the flowers meant, go over to Steve’s apologize for running away, tell him he loved him and he was sorry, and they’d live happily ever after. Yeah, like that shit ever fucking happened. Steve was probably still freaked the fuck out since Bucky had stupidly told him he loved him _and_ told him he’d been in love with him in high school, too. That shit was puppy love and he knew it, but Steve didn’t and was probably freaked out. Like…what if he thought Bucky was obsessed with him or something now? What if he thought Bucky had stalked him or some shit? What if he thought he’d only taken the job because of who he was? What if he thought Bucky was just some kind of freaky weirdo that only wanted him because of who he’d been in high school? Maybe he wouldn’t have called or texted so many times if he thought that, but maybe he would’ve too.

“Breathe, James.”

“What?”

“Breathe. You’re all right.” Natasha gripped his hand tightly as he sucked in a deep breath and realized he didn’t know how long he’d been sitting there. Didn’t know how long he’d been holding his breath. Didn’t know how long he’d been holding that damned pastry. Didn’t know how many times Natasha had tried to speak to him before he heard her. “Hey, come back now. Don’t leave again. I got you.”

“Sorry.”

“It’s okay. Three things, right? Or at least three things. Tell me.”

He let out a shuddering breath then looked at their table. “Coffee cups. Weird donut thing. You.” He knew he should go along and finish the list, things he could hear or smell, but he didn’t want to. Didn’t want to do anything but go back to bed and wallow in his misery like he should allowed. “I’ll be okay.” He knew not to tell her he was okay because he wasn’t and her Bullshit Meter was perfect. “Why’d you bring me out?”

“Because you need human interaction. You can’t keep hiding away like you’ve been doing. I know you don’t…you just…he just…you both…” She growled and he took a sip of the coffee he didn’t want to hide his smile. He’d never seen her at a loss for words before. He was actually kind of enjoying it. It didn’t last though. “All you two had to do was talk. Neither one of you could open your damn mouths and say what you needed to say.”

“I still don’t appreciate being set up, by the way. That was bullshit.”

“I accept that. But not all of this is my fault. Things would have been a lot different if you two had just talked.”

For real? Was she fucking serious right now? After how hard she went after him for sleeping with Stark? She was gonna pull this shit? “Are you or are you not the one that chewed my ass for fucking Stark?”

“Yes, but.”

“No. No buts. It’s not my fault he wanted more than what we agreed on when we started sleeping together. He made it weird. Not me. And you jumped my ass over it when I quit. Told me I was stupid for fucking him to begin with and stupid for quitting my job because shit got weird. So I tried to do the opposite this time and look where it got me. So you don’t get to talk right now. I am done taking advice from you.”

She stared at him for a long moment, eyes carefully blank, but he knew he’d hurt her feelings. Still it wasn’t her place to ‘help’ him. He was fine on his own. He would be fine. Eventually. At some point. Hopefully soon. He missed the twins, missed seeing what little of Steve he had seen. He wanted them back in his life but he didn’t know where to start. What to say, what to do. He needed…he needed to find out what those flowers meant. Needed to see if Natasha wasn’t as full of shit as he thought she was. He still almost didn’t want to.

“I’m sorry, James. I just wanted you to be happy. You hadn’t been happy in so long and I knew Steve and the twins…I thought they’d make you happy.”

“They did. The twins. If shit had worked out different, if he and I had met under different circumstance, he might have too. But you knew he wouldn’t have given us a chance. He doesn’t seem like the dating type. Not really.”

“Steve has been on two dates since the twins were born. A handful of one night stands. He puts them first. Always.”

“And I didn’t even know he was gay. I thought he was straight this whole time and then when Sam was over that evening and they went to the bar I thought ‘oh, he’s already got a partner’ and he was crying when he got home. I thought Sam had dumped him.”

“He was crying over you, idiot.” Bucky gave her a look that said exactly what he thought of that statement. Sam had texted her that night and told her that Steve and Bucky needed to get their shit together, but she hadn’t gotten it until she got home. She and Sam, though they didn’t talk all that much knew how stupid these two were over each other. It was driving them both equally insane. Her phone buzzed and she almost smiled thinking that it was probably Sam knowing she was thinking about him. She pulled her phone out and frowned at the mission notice on the screen. Shit. “I have to go.”

“Work again already?”

“Yeah.”

“How long?”

“Don’t know yet. I’ll text you before I head out.” She stood then stepped over to his side of the small table. “I just want you happy, Bucky. Get that book, okay? Promise me.” She knew he wouldn’t do it unless she made him promise. “And promise you’ll read it, too.”

“Damn it, Nat. Fine I promise.”

She gave him a tight hug and kissed his cheek then walked away leaving him to his thoughts. He didn’t want to be left with them. He’d had them all weekend. He sighed then picked up his coffee and downed it and then picked up her cup and finished it off too. No sense in wasting it. He folded up the pastries in a napkin and shoved them in his hoodie pocket then left the coffee shop to go in search of his stupid book full of its stupid flowers.

He walked into the first bookshop he found and grabbed the clerk and awkwardly asked for a book on the names and meanings of flowers. She gave him a knowing look, as if she knew anything, and then found him two books. One covered the flowers the other didn’t apparently. Bucky kind of just thought she wanted to make a sale, but whatever. He bought both of them and then made his way home.

He didn’t read them just then, but sat them next to the stack of sketches. He’d do it. He would. Just…not right now. Before Natasha got back from wherever they were sending her this time. That way he could at least tell her he’d done it. There was a knock on the door as he went to sit on his bed and he frowned looking toward his bedroom door as if he could see through the rest of the house to see who was there. No one ever showed up unannounced. Not if they knew what was good for them. Natasha had so many security features he was amazed he could get in sometimes. He sighed then slumped his way out of his room. Looked like taking a nap was going to have to wait a little while longer.

***

Steve shifted from foot to foot as he waited for someone to answer the door. He figured it would be Natasha, it was her place after all, but what if it was Bucky? He gulped at the thought and glanced back to the paper wrapped canvas that he had leaned against the house next to the door. Probably this was an epically bad idea, but the devastation on the twins’ faces this morning had broken his heart and he wasn’t good with words. Never had been, but maybe he could be for this. He could try at least and he had promised the twins he would. Even if Bucky didn’t come back to work maybe he and Steve could come up with some kind of…agreement? Arrangement? He didn’t know, but something had to give.

The door opened and he bit back a gasp when he saw Bucky standing in the doorway, one hand still on the knob, the other bracing himself on the jamb. He was gorgeous, would always be gorgeous, but he looked so miserable. Dark circles lined those ice blue eyes that were currently bloodshot; those adorable crinkles from when he smiled were absent. A frown turned down the corners of his gorgeous mouth. He almost had a full beard now instead of the scruff he usually kept.

“Natasha isn’t home,” he said gruffly, as if that would ever change, and began to close the door.

“Wait, please. I…need…can we just…can we talk? Please?”

“There’s nothing to talk about, Steve.”

“The twins…look; I’m not guilt tripping you, but I had to tell my babies that you quit this morning and it sucked. I don’t…I’m not good with words okay? I am supremely not good with them, but…here.” Steve held out the mostly empty sketchbook he’d been holding. It only had three sketches in it. The one of Bucky dancing, the caricature of himself, and one that Steve had drawn this morning of Bucky’s smiling face. Every detail lovingly rendered -this one in color- and with a single perfect red rose tucked in his hair at his temple. Steve might not be able to say the words out loud, not yet, but he could at least say ‘I love you’ like that. “Take it, please. So I can stop standing here like a dumbass.” Bucky finally reached out and took the sketchpad. “I uh…I’m sorry for…Friday. I didn’t mean…I didn’t mean to hurt you.”

“You didn’t.” Not physically and Bucky had been the one to break his own heart. Steve hadn’t done any of that.

“Okay. Sorry. Um…” he reached over to grab the painting before he forgot it and held that out too. “Here.”

“Another apology?”

“No. A confession.”

“Of what?”

“Things I don’t have words for.”

“Okay.” He took the paper wrapped whatever it was from Steve and sat it just inside the door. He’d look at it later. He had to get away from him before he did something stupid like drag him inside and let him fuck him again. Natasha would kill him if he got fucked on the couch. Not to mention anywhere besides his room had cameras and audio all through it so yeah…not gonna happen.

“Okay,” Steve sighed as he said it and shoved his hands in his pockets. “I guess…see you around maybe?”

“Maybe, yeah.” Bucky highly doubted it. The best thing for both of them probably was to never see each other again.

Steve turned to leave then turned back a step later. “Can I ask you something real quick?”

“Might as well.”

“What did you mean about loving me since high school?”

Bucky’s face seemed to pale and flush at the same time, leaving him looking slightly ill. “Um…you…we went to…I was…wait here!” Bucky backed into the house and swung the door shut so Steve wouldn’t follow him in then ran up the stairs to the attic to get the yearbook so he wouldn’t actually have to tell Steve anything. If Steve didn’t have to use his words, neither did he. He grabbed the book from the box, stringing other keepsakes across the wooden floor then rushed back downstairs and to the door. He swung it open and thrust the book out to Steve. “You left before the year was up.”

Steve took the yearbook, one from his disastrous high school days, and frowned down at the cover. He didn’t have any yearbooks from school. Hadn’t wanted any and he’d left before this one had come out. He heard Bucky mumble something about puppy love and almost smiled. Steve flipped open the book, glancing at all the assholes he’d gone to school with. The ones that had tortured and made fun of him for years. When he got the pictures by grade he scanned the names, two pages into those he saw James Barnes in a baseball uniform for his yearbook photo. Holy fuck. “You pulled Rumlow off of me. I punched you for it.”

Bucky gave him a half-laugh and nodded. “Not the best thank you I’ve ever gotten, to be honest.”

“If it makes you feel any better I had a crush on you and I panicked.” He gave Bucky a sheepish smile as he handed the yearbook back.

Bucky did laugh then, not enough that his eyes crinkled, but enough that he didn’t look quite so miserable. “I didn’t know it was you at first. I mean…you were so tiny back then. And I already…it was after I realized I…you reminded me of him and I thought maybe…but…so I looked and there you were.”

“Jesus.” Steve looked like he’d been thrown for a loop and Bucky nodded again, slowly backing into the house.

“Yeah. You should go, Steve. I…the twins will be home soon.”

Steve nodded. “Yeah. Goodbye, Bucky.”

“Bye, Steve.” He backed the rest of the way inside and shut the door, pretending he didn’t see the heartbroken look on Steve’s face as he did. Jesus Christ. So much for not talking. He tossed the damned book on the coffee table then walked into the kitchen to dig out his Death by Chocolate ice cream and a spoon. He was going to need it while he looked at the sketches and whatever else it was that Steve had brought him.

***

Thirty minutes later he was surrounded by sketches, the books that would tell him which flower meant what, an almost empty melted carton of ice cream that he’d been drinking since about fifteen minutes in, (don’t judge him) and the new sketchbook that was opened to a sketch of him dancing in Steve’s kitchen. Apparently Steve had been watching him longer than he thought he’d been. And Bucky definitely looked as sexual as he thought he might have at the time. Shit. But had Steve only seen him that way? Or was Steve that into him? Had he actually been dancing like that? Still…it was gorgeous. He looked gorgeous. He’d never seen himself that way before. Not looking so serene and sensual at the same time.

He looked at the flower, studying it for a long moment before sitting his melted ice cream aside and picking up one of the books. This shit would be a lot easier if Steve had labeled the flowers so he’d know what he was supposed to look for. They weren’t even in color! Still, though, how many flowers could possibly have little bunches of almost tear drop shaped white petals? Three pages in, he sighed heavily. It was going to be a long afternoon and an even longer night.

***

At four in the morning he was sobbing into his pillow, the sketches and painting littered around him on the bed. Fucking…fucking stupid Steve! Fucking love letters. This whole fucking time. Why hadn’t he just fucking said something? It was his fault too, treating Steve like crap the whole time, but Steve had still managed to fall in love with him. How? How the hell had Steve seen him through all of that? Yeah, most of the sketches were of him with the twins, but still. Steve had fallen in love with him by watching how he’d acted with them? What a fucking punk. Jesus. He rolled over, careful of the most precious things in his possession, and stared up at the ceiling.

He’d started from the first sketch Steve had given him and worked his way forward. His heart breaking and mending itself the entire time. His chest loosening and tightening with every newly discovered meaning behind what he’d thought was Steve’s dorky signature. Each one of them proclaimed something close to love and Bucky had been too stupid to see it. No, not stupid. Just uninformed. How was he supposed to have known what all those flowers meant? How many people actually still knew that besides Steve? Well, obviously the people that wrote the books, but still. How much more obvious could Steve have been? He’d been practically spelling it out with every additional sketch and Bucky hadn’t known. Hadn’t realized just how much of himself Steve was laying out at his feet. He’d walked all over that without knowing it. Stomped it into the mud and walked away.

And the painting? Jesus. He sat up and pulled it into his lap, staring at his own eyes shining from the canvas. It looked like a photograph. So perfectly done that if Bucky hadn’t been holding it up close for the last hour before he’d broken down crying and had only seen it from across the room he’d have thought it was a photograph. Not only were all the flowers Steve had already given him on the painting but there were new ones. And now he knew all of their names and what they meant.

Lavender for love and devotion, peach blossoms that meant Steve was his captive and wasn’t that fucking amazing? That he’d captivated Steve? He didn’t know if he’d ever captivated anyone before. And he’d enchanted him too, which was what the Vervain was for. The little star shaped Arbutus meant ‘thee only do I love’ and lemon leaves for everlasting love. Bucky had started crying all over again at those two. He’d ugly sobbed for the Sweet William because he’d never given Steve the purely happy smile he’d given the twins. And his heart had broken all over again at the funky acorn looking things that were apparently Yew flowers and meant sorrow.

Christ. He wanted to rush over to Steve’s and throw himself in his arms and tell him he was sorry and he loved him and he was sorry he had treated him badly and sorry he hadn’t said anything before. Explain that he’d only been trying to keep from getting close to him and how horribly he had failed. He wanted to strangle Steve too. For not telling him about the flowers, for not saying anything either. It was just as much his fault as it was Bucky’s. He couldn’t do that though. It would wake up the twins and Steve would probably think he was having another panic attack or something. Which he kind of was, but not the kind he usually did. This was a happy kind of panic instead of an all-consuming doomy sort. He kind of liked it. Aside from the stuffy nose and swollen eyes.

Steve gave him flowers. Told him an entire story in the blooms and now that he knew what they all meant, now that he’d seen the final sketch of himself with a red rose tucked into his hair and smiling so widely his eyes crinkled, the final ‘I love you’, he was going to give Steve some flowers back. He just had to wait until the flower shop opened.

***

Lexi walked down the stairs rubbing his eyes sleepily and yawning even though he’d already dressed in his school clothes. Lexa came stumbling down them seconds later looking as exhausted as her brother. Both of them looking about as exhausted as Steve felt.

“Did he come back yet,” they asked. He shook his head as he herded them toward the kitchen for their breakfast.

“No. I’m sorry. Give him a couple more days, okay? If he doesn’t come back by then I’ll call him again.” It had been two days since Steve had given Bucky the last three sketches and the painting. He’d hoped that Bucky would’ve come back by now, but maybe he needed more time. It was probably a lot to process all at once.

When he’d told the twins about his plan, shitty though it was, they seemed to approve, but it also meant telling them that he was in love with their nanny. And hadn’t that been an awkward fucking conversation? Surprisingly, though it shouldn’t have been a surprise at all what with how smart they were, the twins had already known how he felt about Bucky. Told him that Bucky felt the same. He had told them about the sketches and the flowers and what they meant, except for the coriander because he was not going to have that conversation with his babies. Not yet. Not for fifteen or twenty years if he was lucky. They had given him the look they had learned from Natasha, the one that told him he was stupid and yeah…he kind of had to agree with them on that one. He was stupid, but was Bucky so he figured they might be just about even.

“Daddy?”

“Yeah, baby?” he looked up form where he’d been staring down at the table and sighed.

“You’re not going to look for a new nanny for us are you?”

“No, Lexi. No more nannies.”

“But you need help sometimes.”

“I can get by on my own.”

“You don’t have to though. Auntie Tasha probably knows someone else.”

Steve huffed. “I don’t think we’ll be asking Auntie Tasha for more help. Kind of didn’t turn out the way we expected it to this time around.”

“Eh, you might’ve finally found a boyfriend though.”

“What makes you think I even want one?”

Lexa giggled then took a bite of her cereal. “You love Mr. Bucky.”

“You’re not old enough to talk about boyfriends. Eat your cereal.”

“Yes, Daddy.” She smiled sweetly, the same smile he had before he did something ornery, and he raised a brow waiting for whatever it was she or Lexi would say next.

“Is this a good time to tell you that we know Auntia Tasha is our mommy?”

Steve choked on his coffee while the twins giggled. “What!”

“Daddy, please. Where else would we get this red hair? Grandma didn’t have red hair and neither did Grandpa. Me and Lexi known since we were like seven. We were waiting to see when you’d tell us.”

“She’s your birthmother, yes. Does she know that you know?”

“Probably. We didn’t tell her though.”

“Jesus. Okay. Are there any question you need to ask?”

“No. We know you like guys and we already covered basic biology in science.” Lexi rolled his eyes as he said it, sounding like he’d had to put up with way more in his short life than he should have and Steve rolled his own eyes.

“Good. Glad that’s out of the way.” There was a knock on the door  and he glanced toward it, eyes automatically going to the small spider web of cracks in the tiny glass window from Bucky’s head. He kind of thought it gave the leaded glass more character. He probably ought to get it fixed at some point though. “Finish your breakfast, heathens.”

The twins giggled again as he sat his coffee cup down and went to answer the door. He was met with a giant riotous bouquet of flowers and gasped. What? He tried to look past them but couldn’t. There were easily a hundred flowers in it. All of them in varying shades of blues, whites, reds, purples, pinks, and greens. It took him a moment to separate the wild bunch into flowers he recognized and when he did he gasped. Every single flower he had ever drawn on his sketches for Bucky was there. Even the ones from the painting. Even ones that he knew for a fact were hard to find and had to be ordered specially. All that the bouquet lacked were the Burdock, the Sweet William, and the yellow Acacia. In their place were close to a dozen new flowers. Pink Camellia for longing for you, scarlet Fuchsia for confiding love, Gorse for endearing affection, Alstroemeria for devotion, white Carnation for pure love, gardenia for sweet love, Balsam for ardent love, Ambrosia for your love is reciprocated, Balloon flower for endless love, and coral Honeysuckle and red Chrysanthemum for I love you.

Jesus. Oh, God. He blinked what he realized were tears from his eyes and sniffled. Holy shit. “Bucky?” The bouquet lowered and he gasped again when he finally saw that happy smile he had always wished to see directed at him. He didn’t fail to notice the single red rose tucked in Bucky’s hair either.

“Hi, Steve.” Bucky shoved the flowers toward him awkwardly and Steve took them, clutching them to his chest. “So, I may have gotten some advice from Natasha.” Steve snorted and Bucky nodded with a quiet laugh. “And I may have followed it and got a couple books on floriography. Turns out the guy I’m kinda madly in love with is a huge nerd. There’s not a flower for that I don’t think. I looked around a bit and didn’t find one. Anyway, those are for you and uh…this one is for us, if you’ll have it.” He pulled his other hand from behind his back and held out a Celandine, a small yellow flower that meant future joy.

Steve sniffled again and nodded, reached out to take it, but paused with his fingers only inches away from the stem. If Bucky could use his flowers then Steve could use his words. “I love you, Buck.”

“I love you too, ya fuckin’ nerd.” Bucky shove the dainty flower into Steve’s hand then pulled him out onto the porch and kissed him under the morning sun. He heard the twins yelling and giggling and laughed into the kiss, pulling away slowly after one last peck. “Also, I quit. Officially, since I never said one way or the other. ‘Cause uh…I kinda can’t work for a guy I’m in love with. That would just be weird.”

“It would.”

“But-” he added when the twins started whining from where they were now standing next to their father instead of eating their breakfast like Bucky thought they should be. “I think we can work something out with watching them after school and continuing the piano lessons.”

The twins jumped up and down excitedly again, both of them yelling and clapping and hugging each other. Steve nodded with a blinding smile. “Yeah, I think we can work something out, Buck.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for sticking it out! I'm sorry it took so long to finish. There was going to be an epilogue, but when I got done I realized it didn't need one. It's fine like it is and that the Celadine stands for the rest of their lives there we go. 
> 
> Thank you for all the kudos and comments along the way! Love ya'll.


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